Chuck vs Real Life
by Altonish
Summary: The Intersect mission finally comes to an end. Now Chuck has to find his place in real life. Unfortunately the NSA has a way of ruining Chuck's dreams for the future. They have a way of ruining Sarah's dreams too. What does the end mean for Chuck/Sarah
1. Chapter 1 The End of the Fantasy

_**Disclaimer:**_ _Not a dime to be had, as I don't own Chuck._

_A/N: I'm starting to post this sooner than I'd like. This is mostly because the history of this timeline is getting corrupted by the show. I'm not sure how frequently this will get updated it's a side project. It's very different for me, so please let me know what you think. _

Chuck vs. Real Life Chapter 1: The End of the Fantasy

"We need to talk," Casey said quickly as he approached Chuck. "Castle, fifteen minutes." Casey started to brush past him.

"Casey, I've got these work orders I have to get finished, Big Mike is really riding me…" Chuck stopped as he saw the glare on Casey's face. "I'll…I'll be there." Casey nodded and walked away.

Three years of working with Casey hadn't dulled the scary looks. Chuck was no longer afraid that Casey would really hurt him. Embarrass him, harass him, threaten him, sure, but Casey had never really injured him after three years of threats, he probably wasn't going to start today. Still, Chuck didn't like messing with Casey when he was in this kind of a mood.

Chuck pawned the work order job off on, Bucky, the Nerd Herd desk's newest resident and made his way over to the Orange Orange. "Hi," he greeted Sarah with a smile.

"Hi, Chuck." She quickly returned his smile and then automatically turned off the open sign and pressed the button behind the register that locked the door.

"How are you today," Chuck asked.

"I'm good."

"That's great, we have a new mission?" Chuck asked.

"Something like that." Sarah pulled the door to the freezer open and then opened the sub-door that led into the Castle.

"We've got plans with Ellie and Awesome this weekend."

"I know, I remember," Sarah replied defensively.

"I know you never forget these things." Chuck shrugged. "But Ellie asks me to remind you, so…"

Sarah nodded. "I don't mind."

"Thanks, for you know, spending time with her. I…" Chuck didn't really know what to say. The last year since he'd moved out of Casa Bartowski things had been weird between Chuck and Sarah. Without the constant need to reinforce their cover relationship and with Chuck coming to the realization that it was never going to happen, there was a distance between them now. It made things easier, most of the time, but as much as Chuck had hated the agony of maybe, the cold specter of never hurt worse. It didn't help the Ellie to every opportunity to cajole Chuck about popping the question. They didn't even really go on cover dates anymore. They hung out sometimes as friends, but Sarah had become less and less willing to even do that in recent months. She was still a major part of his life, but it wasn't the same as it had been two years ago, when he though it was just a matter of time until he wore her down and they became a real couple.

That's why when his head slumped forward against the desk while they waited for Casey, that Chuck was surprised that Sarah started rubbing his shoulders with her hand. He lifted his head and looked over his shoulder at her. She smiled at him. "Rough week?" she asked.

"The Buy More is getting to me. Having two jobs is awful; I don't know how you and Casey do it."

"It's challenging some days," Sarah replied. "But it's really been worth it."

"Been?" Chuck asked. Sarah blushed slightly, but before Chuck could question her further the door slammed open and Casey came tromping down the stairs. "Hope I'm not interrupting?"

"What exactly would you be interrupting?" Chuck asked. In three years he and Sarah had never shared more than a few inappropriate moments and those amounted to a few kisses and some emotional comforting after particularly rough missions.

Casey smiled. "Who knows what you two love birds get up to when I'm not around."

Chuck glanced at Sarah when she didn't immediately retort. She was smirking. It wasn't like her to let that pass. "Are we ready?" she asked instead.

"Sure," Chuck replied.

Sarah clicked a button on the monitor and a few moments later General Beckman appeared before them. "Good morning, Team Bartowski."

"Good morning, General," they replied.

"I have good news," the General said. Then she did something Chuck had ever only seen her do once before, it had been when they'd don a mission with Roan Montgomery, she smiled. The three of them waited a moment while the General let that statement float out there. "We have completed testing on the replacement for the Intersect. It has a new name which I cannot share with you, but it should increase our nation's security by a factor of ten.

Chuck's eyebrows shot up. "Wow, that's impressive."

"Yes and I'm sure quite a relief for you, Mr. Bartowski."

"I had kind of been wondering if I would be the Intersect for the rest of my life. Not that I haven't enjoyed working with you guys." Chuck nodded to Sarah and Casey. "But sometimes I wondered if I'd have to work at the Buy More until I hit the mandatory retirement age."

"You've done some excellent work for us Intersect. I do have one final mission for you, however. We need you to fly to Washington and undergo an evaluation. To help us better understand how you were able to process this information and to better understand what the risks are to you in the future."

"Risks?" Chuck asked.

"There is still and abundance of secret information contained within the Intersect. We need to find out what kind of threat that presents going forward." The statement was ominous and Chuck didn't miss the danger in the General's tone.

Sarah's hand came to rest on his shoulder. "Don't worry, Chuck. Agent Casey and I will be coming with you." Chuck immediately felt better about the situation.

"Okay, well I'll have to get some time off from the Buy More, when do we leave?"

"You fly out on Sunday and should be returning late on Friday."

"Wow, short notice, I'll talk to Big Mike immediately."

"See that you do," General Beckman nodded. "Unless there is anything else?" Neither of the agents responded. So General Beckman bid them a good day.

Casey immediately bolted for the door and Chuck watched his retreating back curiously. He turned to Sarah. "So you're finally going to be free of me, eh?"

Sarah looked decidedly melancholy as she responded. "Pretty exciting news, huh?"

"Yeah, I guess." Chuck shrugged.

"Why aren't you more excited?" Sarah asked.

"Do you remember when you first told me I was the Intersect?"

"Of course."

"Well it was pretty unbelievable that suddenly I had all these secrets and I didn't adjust to that all that well."

"I think you adjusted amazing well."

"It's just a lot to process you know."

Sarah's smile turned into a small frown. "I know."

"Look I have to get back to the Buy More and ask Big Mike for some time off, but we'll talk later, yeah?"

"Tonight?" Sarah asked.

"Sure, are you up for a cover date?" Chuck asked.

Sarah's face fell and Chuck wondered what he'd said wrong. "Yeah, what time?"

"I'll pick you up at seven?" Chuck asked.

Sarah nodded. "I'll see you then."

***

Chuck walked calmly up to Sarah's door and knocked. He was dressed in his standard cover date attire. Blue jeans a button down shirt and a sport coat. Sarah opened the door a moment later and Chuck's jaw almost hit the floor. Sarah was wearing a very short red silk dress and matching heels. The dress was so short Chuck was sure that if Sarah had to reach for anything tonight, he'd definitely be able to see her gun.

"Wow…" he stammered.

Sarah smiled widely. "I didn't know I still had that effect on you."

"I…I… you look so amazing. You always look great, so I'll never understand how you can make yourself so stunning. You're right though, you think I'd be used to it by now."

If anything Sarah's smile got larger. "Should we go?" she asked.

"I feel kind of underdressed."

"You're fine."

"So what did I do to deserve all this?" Chuck offered his arm to Sarah and she took it.

"This could be our last official cover date, I just wanted it to be special."

"Ah, pity," Chuck nodded. "It's all becoming clear."

Sarah whacked him with her clutch. The elevator arrived and as they stepped on Sarah asked. "We've been together a really long time. Is it wrong for me to want it to be special?"

"No," Chuck shook his head. "I just wish I'd known. I'd have made bigger plans for tonight."

"Really? What are we doing tonight?"

"I thought we go to dinner and just talk for a while. This mission is going to be over soon and I'm really going to miss you."

"That sounds perfect."

"Really?"

"Really."

***

Chuck and Sarah got a quiet table at the back of an Indian restaurant in Burbank.

"Morgan swears by this place," Chuck said.

"I see, another fancy evening with Chuck Bartowski," Sarah joked.

"Well I do work at the Buy More."

"I bet your looking forward to moving on from that at least," Sarah said as she looked over the menu.

"I guess."

"Chuck?" Sarah gazed at him over his menu. "Come on, what's wrong, why aren't you happy?"

"I don't know. It just doesn't feel right. I'm worried about this thing in Washington next week. What if they decide I'm a threat to national security?"

Sarah gazed at him. "You know I'd never let anyone hurt you. That includes the government." She went back to looking at her menu.

"You know I can't ever thank you enough for all you've done for me, right?"

"You don't have to. This is the best assignment I've ever had."

"Babysitting me is the best assignment you've ever had?"

Sarah's eyes flashed dangerously as she looked up from the menu. "Maybe Casey feels like that's all this mission was. My time here has meant a lot to me."

"Do you ever wonder what your life would be like if you'd gone with Bryce?" Chuck asked.

"No." Sarah replied flatly.

"Honestly? You don't even think about it?"

"Bryce was a mistake, Chuck."

"Oh."

"Look, I don't want to talk about Bryce tonight okay? He's been gone a long time and I know you guys were friends, but that's a chapter of my life that's over. I'm glad of it." Sarah looked at him slightly apologetically and Chuck felt guilty for bringing it up. Throughout their time together Bryce had been a sore spot for each of them.

"You're right," Chuck agreed. "So where do you go from here, Agent Walker?"

"Please, Chuck, call me Sarah, I think the days of asset and handler are over."

Chuck gazed at her. She was watching him as if waiting for a reaction to her words. Chuck didn't know what to say. "Okay, Sarah, what does the future hold for you?"

"We're off to Washington in a couple of days and then I guess we'll see?"

"Are you coming back from Washington with me?" Chuck asked, his suspicions raised from her answer. She wouldn't just escort him to Washington and then abandon him. She couldn't, whatever they were, they were more than that.

"I don't know," Sarah replied. "There are a lot of questions in Washington."

"What does that mean?" Chuck pressed.

Sarah sighed and released the wine glass she'd been playing with. "It means a lot of things are still up in the air. Who knows what's going to happen."

Chuck studied Sarah's posture, her words, the way her fingers were fidgeting. "You don't think they're going to shove me in a bunker do you?" Chuck asked.

Sarah's back was suddenly ramrod straight. She looked him in the eye, the way she always did when she wanted him to really believe something. "We've talked about this, I wouldn't let them. I meant it. That is not an option."

Chuck gave her a grateful smile. "I don't know how I got so lucky as to have you as my handler."

Sarah grimaced. "I don't know that _lucky _is quite the right description."

"I'm serious, I'd have never made it through this without you. You've always looked out for me, taken care of me, protected me. I'd have been in a bunker or worse years ago if it wasn't for you."

"Well…" Sarah gave him a rare shy grin. "Maybe the universe was just paying you back for all the crap it dropped at your feet and expected you to take care of by yourself. You deserved my best and I tried to make sure I gave it to you, even if sometimes that didn't make you happy."

"I was an idiot," Chuck grinned. "You can hardly blame me. I had you pretending to be my girlfriend, who wouldn't want that to be real?"

"You weren't an idiot, you were sweet and caring and romantic and extremely convincing."

"Well I'm sorry I took so long to catch on and made you uncomfortable."

"Don't be sorry." Sarah shook her head. "You've given me so much, helped me so much. If things had been different…" Sarah shrugged.

"Would you have really wanted that though? I mean I'm still a guy that works at the Buy More."

Sarah nodded. "I definitely wanted to. The toughest part about being a spy is keeping your emotions from getting involved. But you know the drill, to protect you I had to be objective."

"I know." Chuck agreed. "And hey, you were really nice about letting me down easy. I mean the repeated rejections stung a little, but for the most part I never felt like you were repulsed or anything."

Sarah frowned. "Chuck, my rejections were never about you, you know that."

"I know."

They finished their dinner and took a walk out the Santa Monica pier. Chuck gave Sarah his sport coat as she really wasn't wearing much and it was cool with the evening breeze. Chuck put his arm around her as they strolled and Sarah put her head on his shoulder. They stopped not far from where Sarah had first asked Chuck to trust her. It was fitting. "Thank you, Sarah," Chuck said quietly his throat scratchy. "For everything."

"It was my pleasure."

They stood together and watched as the sun went down on their very last cover date.


	2. Chapter 2 It's Only a Test

_**Disclaimer:**__ Do you own Chuck? I didn't think so, it appears we have something in common. I also don't own Chuck. So what now, do we like form a club or something?_

Chapter 2: It's Only a Test

"Hey, El, can I borrow your travel alarm?"

"Sure!" Ellie agreed happily and went into her room to retrieve it. A few moments later she returned with it in hand. "This is so exciting!"

Chuck rolled his eyes. "It's just a little vacation."

"But Sarah's taking you back to Washington, you're going to meet her family, aren't you?"

"I've already met her father, and I don't really think it's anything like that."

"But she's from D.C."

"Yeah, but not like, _originally,_ she just had a job there."

"Still in three years this is the first real vacation the two of you have taken together, why aren't you more excited? You seem nervous… Oh, Chuck, are you finally going to pop the question?" Ellie was starting to bounce.

"Ellie, calm down, I am NOT proposing, I'm not meeting her family, it's just a trip."

"Well if it's _just _a vacation, don't you think you could have picked somewhere a little more romantic?"

"I didn't pick the location," Chuck sighed.

"Come on, Chuck, what's going on, you should be super excited. You guys have been on the slow track since forever. This sounds like progress to me. Do you not love Sarah anymore?"

"No, no, I still love Sarah, it's just things are different now. I think…I think maybe she wants to go back and reconnect with some of her old work contacts. I think she might be planning on moving back their permanently."

"Really?" Ellie asked. "She hasn't said anything."

"I know, it's just a feeling. I think she might be done with L.A."

"Then go with her." Ellie stated flatly.

"I _am_ going with her."

"No, I mean move back to Washington with her. If the love of your life is moving to Washington D.C. then go back there with her. What's keeping you here, the Buy More? Honestly, Chuck, you've been grumbling about quitting that place for years now. If Sarah gets a job in D.C. you should just go with her. She loves you, she'd like that."

"I don't think so, El. We'll see, I guess, who knows, maybe it's nothing and she just wants to visit the Smithsonian."

"That sounds more like you, than Sarah." Ellie laughed. "Just promise me, that you'll be supportive of her. From all that I've seen the last three years, we're all she has."

"Of course I will be. I just want what's best for her."

Ellie drew him into a hug. "I know you do. _You're _what's best for her, don't forget that. You guys have a great trip.

***

Chuck wished Ellie goodbye and returned home to pack the last few items into his bag. Sarah knocked on his door a short while later to pick Chuck up. Except when they got to his parking lot he found a cab waiting for them instead of Sarah's Porsche.

"Where's your car?" Chuck asked.

"The CIA has it," Sarah replied causally as they got settled in the back of the cab.

"So you're really not coming back at all?"

Sarah gave the smallest of shrugs. "We'll see, but all signs point to Agent Casey escorting you home."

"Oh. Am I going to see you again after the flight today?"

"Of course," Sarah assured him. "I'm sure we'll see each other during the debriefing process, but I promise you'll see me again before you leave Washington. I couldn't…I can't …I wouldn't not say goodbye."

"It's really over isn't it?" Chuck asked.

"Yep," Sarah replied. She wouldn't look at him; she hadn't looked at him since they left his apartment.

The hour long trip to the airport was murderously awkward. Chuck just didn't know what to say and Sarah didn't seem to want to talk very much. They got their bags checked and bypassed security through a back door with just a flash of Sarah's badge and explanation that she was escorting someone important. The airport security gave Chuck a hard, questioning look, wondering how important he could really be, but they did let them through. A handful of minutes later Chuck found himself sitting in first class for the first time in his life and sitting comfortably next to Sarah. All in all he had to admit he could get used to traveling like this.

When they'd left the ground Chuck turned to look at Sarah. She was pretending to read the in flight magazine, but she hadn't turned a page in almost ten minutes. "I'm really going to miss you," Chuck said softly.

Chuck had only seen Sarah cry on two occasions, she tended to get angry or violent rather than cry, but there were definitely tears in her eyes as she looked at him. She reached out and took his hand in hers. She clasped them together tightly, interlocking their fingers and she kept a strong grip on his hand. She turned and rested her head on his shoulder. Her vise like grip was cutting off the circulation to his hand, but he didn't really care that much. She'd finally relaxed against his shoulder and she seemed far less tense. Eventually when they were somewhere over Nevada, Chuck sucked in a deep breath an asked. "Do you think—" Chuck felt Sarah stiffen in her seat. "That you might want to give going on a real date one more try?"

Sarah's head jerked up off his shoulder and she started nodding vigorously. "Thank, God," she said. "I was really beginning to think you weren't going to ask."

Chuck laughed lightly. "I didn't figure you'd want me to. I thought you'd probably want a clean break and all."

Sarah's grip on his hand relaxed, but she didn't let it go. She settled her head back on his shoulder. "I just thought, we really ought to be able to have one real date, you know? No deception, no guns, no terrorists, just a date."

"Does it mean that much to you?" Chuck asked.

"Yes, actually"

"You could have just asked me," Chuck replied.

"I could have," Sarah agreed. "But it wouldn't be the same. I sort of tried, you know with our last cover date, but it didn't come out right. That felt more like an ending."

"Are you thinking our date will be the beginning of something more?"

Sarah shrugged. "I'm sure you just want to go back to Los Angeles and forget all about me, but I'd like at least once chance for us to just go out on our terms and have a good time, without any worries about tomorrow. Doesn't that sound good? Not worrying about tomorrow?"

Chuck would have put his arm around her if she didn't have such a good grip on his hand. "That sounds perfect."

Chuck, however, was quite worried about tomorrow, but he felt slightly better because Sarah kept his hand in hers all the way to Washington.

***

Chuck didn't sleep much. It was a stretch to say their hotel was in Washington. They were staying in college park, which was apparently about halfway between Langley Virginia and Fort Meade MD. Sarah was going to have to go to both during the week. Casey, who had already checked in when they got there, was escorting him to Ford Meade this morning. He was likely going to go the entire day without seeing Sarah. Chuck wasn't entirely sure the last time that had happened.

Chuck went down to the hotel lobby and got an early morning breakfast. His instructors always said that was a key to doing well on tests and as Chuck recalled what Sarah told him the night before; he was determined to ace whatever tests they gave him. They'd been lingering in the hallway, Sarah having just escorted Chuck to his room.

"_Casey's on the other side. If you need anything let one of us know." _

"_Sure, right, um goodnight."_

"_Chuck," Sarah reached out and grabbed his arm before he could enter his room. _

"_Yeah?" _

"_Promise me, you'll do your absolute best tomorrow." _

"_Okaaay."_

"_Say it," she prompted._

"_I promise," Chuck replied cautiously. "What's this about?" _

"_You never lie to me," Sarah explained. "If you promise to do your best you will. It's important." _

"_Okay," Chuck said. "For you, I'll ace it." _

_Sarah gave him a bright smile that melted his heart. She was always so serious, but his answer seemed to relieve some of her tension. He couldn't recall Sarah being so nervous in all the time he'd known her. She seemed really stressed. She always got amped up before missions, but she'd been on edge for days. Chuck was glad he could release some of that. _

"_Goodnight, Chuck, I'll see you in a couple of days."_

Now as he sat there eating the rubbery hotel eggs he couldn't help but wonder what had Sarah so concerned. Casey cruised by him dressed in a suit and tie and Chuck wondered if he was under dressed. He didn't own a suit, not one of his own. The CIA had provided several for use on missions, but they always seemed to disappear back where they came from. "Casey?"

"What?"

"Am I dressed okay?"

"Did you bring anything better?" Casey asked.

"No."

"Then, I guess that will do. Are you done, we leave in ten."

"I guess I'll meet you in the lobby?" Chuck asked. Casey grunted his agreement and Chuck went back upstairs. He brushed his teeth and made one more attempt at combing his hair. Chuck was tempted to stop by and talk to Sarah, just because he couldn't imagine not seeing her for a full day. Maybe they would see each other tonight.

Chuck went downstairs and Casey led him over to his rental, it was some gigantic Buick. They were at NSA Headquarters in a matter of minutes. Chuck looked up at the gargantuan black cube. "Somebody was compensating for something weren't they?" Chuck asked.

Casey scowled at him. "No more jokes, Bartowski. When you're here, you show people the proper respect. If you are talking to me or about me, it's Agent Casey. The General is to be referred to as General Beckman. If you don't know somebody's name they're sir or ma'am. Once they are introduced to you, remember their name and use the proper title. It's a sign of respect."

"Okay," Chuck replied. "I can be cool."

"Don't be, don't be you, if you have it in you to be serious for once in your life, for God sake, take this seriously."

"What's going to happen in there?" Chuck asked.

"They're going to decide your future," Casey replied simply. "Let's go."

"My future?"

"Yeah, you know all the stuff that happens after today. Now we can't be late, so let's get in there."

Casey put his NSA credentials on his jacket, Chuck was given a bright yellow badge that proclaimed visitor, no clearance, in red letters.

"No, clearance?" Chuck asked as they walked to the elevator.

"It means you aren't allowed to be in any secured area of the building without someone present and nothing of importance can be discussed in front of you."

"Oh, well that makes me feel important."

"Nobody here knows who or what you are, Bartowski, in the eyes of everyone here, you are not important. It's imperative, that nobody find out what exactly what you are."

"But, I thought I was here to take tests…"

"You are, but from this moment forward forget you have ever even heard the word Intersect, you are just Charles Carmichael, nerd."

Casey scanned a card on the elevator and punched in a button combination. Instead of up they headed down and for quite some time. They walked out to what appeared to be a normal office space except there were no windows. Casey led him through a door to a receptionist. "Dr. Collins, please."

A few minutes later a short man that was wearing a lab coat came out and greeted them. "You're Mr. Carmichael?" the man asked cheerfully.

"That's me."

"It's nice to meet you, Mr. Carmichael. It's always good to meet a young man interested in working at the Agency. Come with me and I'll get you all setup." Collins started walking away and Chuck moved to follow him, but Casey yanked him back.

"Don't attempt to leave this floor without me."

"Sure… What did he mean working at the Agency?"

"Don't worry about it."

***

"Okay, Mr. Carmichael, are you comfortable?

"I guess…" Chuck was in a small room with a computer built into a desk. There were no decorations of any kind. Other than the pale gray walls the only thing to look at was his reflection in what appeared to be a two way mirror. "What exactly will I be doing?"

"It's just a simple test."

"Of what?"

"Cognitive ability and pattern recognition, if you score well on this test, then we'll test your math skills this afternoon."

"Math?" Chuck asked.

"Yes." Dr. Collins nodded excitedly. "Now just relax, this one is the easy one."

Dr. Collins closed the door and a few seconds later the screen on the computer sprang to life. "Which one of these images does not fit?" it asked. There were four images that looked mostly identical on the screen and a counter started ticking down from thirty seconds. "Oh, boy," Chuck sighed.

Chuck's head was pounding when the screen went blank. He felt like he was being tortured. Four hours of sitting there watching different patterns, the worst ones were when something would flash up on the screen for a few seconds and he'd have to pick from a similar batch of images or string of characters which one he'd seen. Thankfully there weren't any flashes during the test. That probably would have killed him. His eyes hurt from staring at the computer. A few minutes after the computer when blank the door swung open and Dr. Collins came in.

"Hello, Mr. Carmichael, how'd it go?"

"I have no idea," Chuck replied.

"That's what everybody says."

"Can I have an ibuprofen or something?"

"I'm sorry, but I can only offer you lunch until the testing is over for the day. Part of the test is handling the stress. The headaches are just a part of it and quite common I'm afraid."

Chuck shook his head. "Fantastic."

"Don't worry, Mr. Carmichael, let me sit you down to lunch and then I'll go get your scores."

Lunch appeared to be a cafeteria inspired ham sandwich, a bag of plain potato chips and an apple Chuck wouldn't have eaten if he'd been stuck on a deserted island with only a volleyball to talk to. There was a cookie, but Chuck didn't eat it for fear of a sugar rush during a math test. It wasn't all bad. Dr. Collins, while being completely unwilling to talk about his work, was a very interesting guy. He'd attended MIT in the early eighties and was an aficionado of all things Battle Star Galactica and while that wasn't Chuck's nerdom of choice, he knew enough to have an engaging discussion on how Apollo came to be the fifth Cylon and the incident with Starbuck right before she saved the human race. Chuck found that to be totally implausible which Dr. Collins said fit right in with the history of the show.

Unfortunately, lunch ended far too quickly. Dr. Collins commended Chuck for his passing score and let him to a similarly depressing room to the one he'd spent the morning in, except there was no computer. There was just a stack of paper and two pencils. "You have four hours," Dr. Collins advised him. "If you come to a problem you don't know, move on, otherwise it's likely you'll waste your time trying to solve problems you won't get right anyway and then you won't make it to the end. Good luck!"

"Thanks."

Chuck turned over the first page and was greeted with a graph and the words: Calculate the area under the graph. "Fan flipping tastick the first page is a Riemann sum, well that's just perfect." Chuck flipped through the test. The questions varied from difficult to incomprehensible. At least the Riemann sum he understood. "Can't you at least give me a calculator?" Chuck asked to the mirror. This was not going to help his headache.

By the end of the test Chuck could honestly say the only enjoyable part of that math test was the Sudoku problem on page 36. He knew more of it than he expected. After all, Chuck did enjoy a good math problem, just not sitting down with fifty of them for an afternoon. In the end he'd answered 37 problems, there were at least ten he had no idea how to solve and a few he just didn't have time to get to.

Dr. Collins greeted him cheerfully and assured him he would have his results soon. Chuck should prepare for another test tomorrow afternoon, but enjoy his morning off. Dr. Collins would have someone contact him with information about if he'd scored high enough to continue. Dr. Collins escorted him back to elevators where Casey was waiting for him. "How'd you do?" Casey asked when they got back to the car.

"Honestly, I have no idea. I feel like I did terrible. That was one of the most difficult things I've ever done."

"It's supposed to be, it's not a test, if it doesn't _test_ you."

"So you've taken that test?" Chuck asked.

"God no," Casey shuttered. "I wouldn't waste my time."

"Well thanks Casey that makes me feel, oh so much better."

"If you did your best, there's no sense worrying about it. You hungry?"

"I'm starving. Starvation is apparently a part of the test."

Casey actually laughed. They stopped at a seafood restaurant not far from the exit to Fort Meade and got a table. Casey offered Chuck a drink, but Chuck really didn't feel up to it, he was exhausted.

Chuck was eating soft shell crab when he glanced at the men sitting at another table. He flashed on a man dressed in a nice suit.

"What's wrong Bartowski."

"I just flashed on that man, he's Admiral David Jacobs. Currently assigned…"

"Quiet," Casey cut him off. "Did the flash say he was doing anything illegal?"

"No," Chuck shook his head.

"Then keep it to yourself. If you're going to be around D.C. that's probably going to happen a lot, you can't go running off at the mouth every time you see someone who has a file in the you-know-what."

"Oh…right." Chuck finished his crab without much conversation. Casey had never been overly fond of talking to him and sharing a meal with the stoic man was just…odd.

Chuck went back to the hotel. He knocked on Sarah's door, but she didn't answer. She'd told him that she was going to be out early and didn't know when she'd be back. So he wasn't surprised, but he was a little depressed. It would have been nice just to see her.

He collapsed face first on his bed and didn't wake up until his phone started ringing.

_A/N: At the time that this was written. The fifth Cylon had not yet been revealed and the show had not ended. (Whatever ending that may happen to be.) It was just speculation on my part. That said I know virtually frakking nothing about Battlestar Galactica as it's not my nerdom of choice. I've only seen a handful of episodes. _


	3. Chapter 3 Chuck vs The Table

Chapter 3

Chuck awoke to the ringing of his phone and scrambled for it. "Hello," he groaned.

"Chuck, congratulations, you did sufficiently well that they want you back today. You've got two hours until we leave, make sure you've eaten."

"What, what time is it?" Chuck asked.

"Oh-ten-hundred," Casey replied.

"I've been asleep for fourteen hours?" Chuck asked.

"Don't ask me, all I know is you didn't leave your room. See you at noon."

"Okay," Chuck groaned. His head felt like liquid cement, he was definitely going to have to find some ibuprofen before they left.

***

Dr. Collins once again met Chuck with a big smile and led him into the examination room with the computer. "I hope you got a good rest between your tests," the doctor said cheerfully.

"Yeah, I slept like a rock."

"That's not uncommon among test subjects. Here's the deal, today's test isn't timed. You'll be dealing with cryptology today. This test is designed to see how long you can keep your focus. There won't be any interruptions during the test, you may keep going as long as you are able. When you've had enough press the button on the desk, that will stop the test and we will come retrieve you."

"How long is the test?" Chuck asked.

"That, Mr. Carmichael, is entirely up to you." Dr. Collins closed the door behind him and the screen in the desk lit up. It showed a basic encoding where every third letter was out of place four spaces. It took him about ten minutes to crack the code and another ten to actually decipher it, once deciphered the result seemed to be the instructions for the next test.

Chuck worked for hours without a break. His eyes were getting blurry and the ciphers were getting harder to come up with. Some of the ciphers were hidden in messages several questions previously. If you didn't get every question there was no guarantee you could get the future ones, so he was really forced to just sit there and bang his head against the problems. He finally got up and took a walk around the cramped room. There wasn't really anything to get his mind off the test, so he stood in front of the mirror and did some calisthenics just to get his blood moving. After breaking for twenty minutes he went back to the test.

The questions were getting harder and taking longer. Either that or Chuck really was losing his focus. His main problem now, was that he was hungry. He didn't know how long he'd been at it, but he knew he hadn't eaten in a long time. Chuck thought long and hard about quitting, but Sarah had made him promise to do his absolute best… As long as he could keep working, he would. Chuck ignored his growling stomach and started making notes on a piece of paper. This looked like a wheel cipher, but he was going to have to code his own wheel. Chuck guessed that that single question took him at least two hours. Chuck flipped to the next question. It looked completely garbled. He flipped back over the previous questions hoping to get some clue as to how to break the code.

Chuck's back was aching. He'd gotten up several times. Sometimes just to think and not sit in the chair anymore. He'd deciphered nineteen messages he'd had two he just couldn't figure out. He was working under the presumption that some of the answers were now in other languages. It made it more difficult, because it was almost impossible to tell if his assumptions were correct. His brain was beginning to swim when he thought about any one problem too long. He was tiring, but he wasn't going to quit. Sarah said this was important. They could carry him out of here if they had to, but he wasn't quitting, he'd rather sleep on top of the desk. When his brain betrayed him and he couldn't think clearly anymore that's exactly what he did.

Chuck awoke with absolutely no clue how long he'd been in the exam room. He didn't know how long he'd been asleep. His stomach hurt, his neck hurt, his back was killing him. Chuck sat down in the chair and went back and studied the cipher he'd been working on. This was all wrong. He was going to have to fix it. Chuck wished he had a real computer. This would be so much easier if he could just write some code to do the deciphering for him. He couldn't find any way to escape the test program and what were the odds that there was a compiling program on this computer anyway?

Two hours later, Chuck decided he didn't care. He started trying to figure out how to escape the test program. He needed more computing power if he was going to keep breaking the questions.

Chuck finally figured out a key combination that brought up a password screen. He couldn't break the password though. He finally gave it up as a bad job, the question were too hard, he couldn't do them without help, if he couldn't find additional resources he might as well stop. If Sarah was disappointed in him for quitting, then he'd make it up to her, somehow. Reluctantly, Chuck pressed the button.

There was no response, for a long time. The computer screen had gone blank when he pressed the button, but the door didn't open. Chuck groaned and lay back down on the desk. He hoped this wasn't what it was like to live in a cell.

***

"Time to go, Bartowski." It was Casey, Chuck must have fallen asleep on the desk again.

"Where's Dr. Collins?" Chuck asked as he stood up and winced.

"Apparently you bored him to death."

"What?" Chuck said surprise. "He's dead?"

"No, you moron, it was a joke. Now, come on, I'm supposed to get you to some food and then you have a meeting."

"What kind of meeting?" Chuck asked.

"With General Beckman."

"Wait…I have to meet the General right now?"

"You've got about ninety minutes."

"Well can't I get a shower or something, I've been in there all night."

Casey shrugged. "You'll have to hurry, but we can probably make it back to the hotel in time. It's your choice, food or shower."

Chuck really did want a shower and to brush his teeth and clean clothes. But he hadn't eaten since lunch the day before. "What time is it?" Chuck asked.

"Just after Oh-Eleven-Hundred."

"I was in there for twenty two hours?" Chuck asked.

"Not quite."

"Well that's…I don't know what that is. I guess I'll pick food." Chuck shrugged.

"I don't know what that is either, but thank you for doing your best." Chuck whipped around and looked at Casey. "Did you just thank me?"

"No," Casey grunted.

"You did, I heard you."

"Bartowski, don't make me hurt you, just get in the car." Chuck smiled widely. Casey had given him an actual unprompted thank you. Chuck didn't think that had happened in all years he'd known the man. Chuck got into the passenger seat beside Casey. "God, Barthowski, wipe that grin of your face. You're like a puppy."

"Sorry," Chuck replied, schooling his features. Casey just took a deep breath and started the car.

***

Chuck's hands were definitely sweating as the elevator continued to climb. He wiped them on his pants nervously. His nervousness at meeting General Beckman in person for the first time was made worse by the fact that his shirt was wrinkled, he wasn't wearing a tie and hadn't had a shower in more than a day. It hardly seemed fair that this meeting should take place when he hadn't slept for more than a few hours in the previous twenty four. Mercifully the elevator finally stopped climbing when the numbers hit 42.

Casey pushed him gently out of the elevator and the doors slid shut behind him. He was stuck here now. They walked down a long well furnished hallway full of closed doors. Some doors had names, some doors just had alpha-numeric codes on them.

They walked all the way to the end of the hallway and opened the last door. Inside was a lobby with two assistants sitting at desks across from one another. One was a young man dressed in Marine full dress uniform and the other was a pretty woman in a smart pantsuit. The Marine nodded to Casey while the woman gave them a wide smile.

"Agent Casey, the General is expecting you. I'll let her know you're here." The woman picked up a receiver and pressed a line on her phone. A moment later she told the General that they were waiting. She put the phone back down and smiled at them. "The General is with someone at the moment please have a seat. Can I get you anything?"

"No thanks, Mrs. Young, we're fine," Casey replied.

"Why does the general have two administrative assistants?" Chuck asked quietly.

"Gunnery Sergeant Hale has a much higher security clearance and a background in military intelligence. He works on classified projects and handles the military contacts. Mrs. Young is a civilian, she keeps the General's calendar and performs the bulk of the strictly administrative tasks. If General Beckman needs to go to a secure facility and needs an assistant, she can't very well take a civilian."

"Oh…that makes sense," Chuck nodded.

"Gunnery Sergeant Hale is also armed," Casey added.

"Oh…" Chuck gulped.

"Mr. Carmichael?" Mrs. Young called. "The General will see you now."

Chuck stood up, but Casey did not. Chuck took two steps before he turned around. "You aren't coming with me?" he asked.

"She didn't ask for me," Casey scoffed. "Go on, I'll be here when you get done."

Chuck followed walked over to Mrs. Young's desk, but all she said, was, "Go right in."

Chuck nodded and took a deep breath before he stepped into the General's office. The first thing he noticed was that the view was amazing. The second thing was that General Beckman's office was huge. The desk that Chuck was used to seeing the General behind was setup on one interior corner and had the camera pointed at it. A much larger and more imposing desk was centered in the room. To Chuck's left there was a conference table and in front of him was a long counter that overlooked the Maryland countryside.

The General was sitting a her desk, her more imposing desk, across from a pepper haired man that Chuck flashed on. He was Larry Snyder the Senior Director of Cryptography and Analysis. "Hello, General, it's nice to finally meet you in person." Chuck greeted her and stuck out his hand. General Beckman stood and shook it, but she did not return his friendly greeting.

"Mr. Carmichael, this is Larry Snyder, we've been discussing your test results."

Chuck shook the man's hand; he had a firm handshake and made Chuck feel slightly uneasy in how directly he looked Chuck in the eye. "It's nice to meet you, Mr. Carmichael."

Chuck took a seat next to Mr. Synder. "So, how'd I do?"

Mr. Snyder turned and looked at the General who nodded. "Your cognitive recognition score was quite frankly amazing. I dare say there are a couple of research departments around here that would love to get their hands on you." The General cleared her throat and Mr. Snyder's eyes widened momentarily. "Right, that's not why we're here though is it? Your math score was very low for someone entering this field of work. I would be concerned that you'd be able to keep up with the necessary math requirement. You may need additional study."

"Oh," Chuck replied in confusion. _What was going on here?_ He wondered

"Now your cryptography exam was quite interesting. We've never had anyone actually sleep in the exam room before. Mind you, it's within the rules of the exam, but what possessed you to keep at it, after you became too tired to continue?"

"My handler's," General Beckman cleared her throat loudly and shot him a sharp look. "Er…the people who've been escorting me through the building…they told me it was important to do my best. I uh…" Chuck gave a tentative glance at the General. "didn't want to disappoint them."

"I see. You did provide a remarkable effort. Most testees start to tire after four to six hours. You'd been working for a solid twelve hours before your little nap. General Beckman claims you hold BS degrees in computer science and physics."

"That's correct." Chuck nodded again glancing at General Beckman who remained silent.

"Did you ever consider taking any advanced mathematics courses while you were attending Stanford?"

"I did have some, but Stanford was a long time ago. It was hard to remember the formulas for some of those questions. I haven't done that kind of math in a long time."

"Do you enjoy math?"

"Sure, I mean I enjoyed it in school. I haven't really done any complex math since college."

Mr. Snyder frowned. "I have to be straight with you, Chuck. These days the kind of cryptography you spent all night working on is done with computer programs. Everything you worked on last night can be decrypted in under an hour by one of our programs. Decryption these days is mostly creating complex mathematical algorithms and letting a super computer crunch away at it. Do you think you'd enjoy that?"

"I'm not sure, it's possible," Chuck shrugged.

"To be honest, you're a little older than someone we'd start training in this kind of thing. What made you interested in cryptography?"

Chuck looked helplessly across the desk at General Beckman who was staring daggers at him. "I …er…I, you know, like puzzles and games with words and numbers. I've always been good with spotting patterns I just thought you know, it would be interesting."

Mr. Snyder nodded. "If you're attune to that sort of thing it can be fascinating, but as long as we're speaking honestly, I have to admit it offers limited career potential outside of the NSA, there are of course private companies that work encrypting information, but the job pool is limited."

Chuck nodded. "I understand."

"Do you have any questions?" Chuck had a million questions, but none that he could ask without talking to Sarah, Casey and General Beckman.

"Uh, not at this time," Chuck said.

"Well it was nice meeting you," Mr. Snyder said and reached out to shake Chuck's hand. "After your test, Mr. Carmichael, I'm sure you're going to be a legend around this place for quite some time, whether we ever work together or not."

"Yeah, it was nice to meet you too," Chuck agreed.

Mr. Snyder left through a side door in the General's office and was gone.

"Was that a job interview?" Chuck asked as the door closed behind him.

"In a manner of speaking, I suppose," replied General Beckman.

"I didn't realize I would be interviewing for a job this week. I thought you were here to run tests on the Intersect."

General Beckman frowned. "I'm not sure how much we could learn by examining _your_ brain. That said, with the end of your mission upon us, it falls to me to figure out what to do with you."

"I always kind of figured I would just go back to my old life. Maybe start a software company or at least work for one, I've got my degree now."

"How very quaint," General Beckman replied dismissively. "But you see, just because we don't need you anymore, doesn't mean it's safe to let you roam around Los Angeles unsupervised. The secrets in your head are still secrets and there are still factions out there that would love to get their hands on them. I cannot allow that."

"What does that mean?" Chuck gulped.

"I have examined several options for what to do with you, Mr. Bartowski and frankly I find all of them unsatisfactory. Your handlers have been quite insistent that you would be of some value to the Agency and I've found it difficult to ignore the service you've provided this country. That may just be because your handlers seem to insist on reminding me every five minutes. I find their dedication to their asset admirable, but I am definitely confused as to what exactly it is about you that causes their attachment."

"We've been a team for a pretty long time now, maybe they're just used to me," Chuck replied.

"Indeed."

"So…what's next for me?"

The General peered him with a hard stare. "Are you and Agent Walker involved in a sexual relationship?" the General asked.

Chuck imagined his eyes must have bulged as he sputtered. "No! I mean we're just friends." Chuck blushed. "I mean for a long time I thought there was something more between us and that I really wanted to have a relationship with her. But Agent Walker has always been clear that we had to maintain a professional relationship."

"Are you sure?" General Beckman continued to stare him down.

"I swear, we're just friends. I was the only one of us who ever acted unprofessionally and Agent Walker…Sarah, well, she mostly tried to let me down easy. She was nice about it, as nice as anybody can be when they are rejecting you."

"I see and would you consider yourself friends with Major Casey?"

Chuck smiled slightly. "He's a difficult nut to crack, but I like to think that we're friends, at least a little. You'd never know for sure if your friends with him I wouldn't think. He's completely closed off. If I played poker, I'd never play with that guy." Chuck pulled nervously on the collar of his shirt. "Do you mind if I ask what this is about, General?"

"Part of the debriefing process, I'd like to know how compromised my agents are, so I know how heavily to weight their opinions of you."

"General, I can assure you neither one of them has been anything but professional during our mission. I can't imagine making it through this experience without either one of them. I'm not cut out to be a spy, I wouldn't have had a chance of making it without their help."

"Of that, I can assure you, I am very aware. The effectiveness of your team was clear, which is why I was willing to look the other way for some of the indiscretions that cropped up over the years. I do indeed realize you are not a spy. Thank you for doing your part to protect the country."

"You're welcome," Chuck replied. Silence settled over the room as General Beckman seemed to be thinking to herself.

"Well," she finally said. "I have a briefing I need to attend. Congratulations, Chuck, on making it this far."

"Ma'am?" Chuck asked in confusion.

"Yes?"

"What's going to happen to me?"

"I haven't decided yet. I'll be meeting with your handlers tomorrow. Presumably some resolution will happen at that time. I will definitely speak with you on Friday before your leave for Los Angeles. Thank you for your time, Mr. Bartowski, but I really must be going."

The General picked up her handset and pushed a number. "Yes, let them know I'll be ready in two minutes." The General picked up a piece of paper and started skimming it. Chuck stood up and took a few steps away from the General's desk, when the General didn't react he started walking away more quickly. It didn't pass his notice that she hadn't so much has shaken his hand. He couldn't help but wonder with all the time that he'd been working with her, why she still disliked him so much.


	4. Chapter 4 Finally, a Real Date

_**Disclaimer: **__An' Here I go again on my own. Going down the only road I've ever known! Like a drifter I was born to not own Chuck….Um, holy crap, I just quoted David Coverdale…Somebody please shoot me!_

Chapter 4 Finally, a Real Date

Chuck asked Casey to stop some place that he could buy some clothes on the way back. The stoic man didn't seem overly happy about it, until Chuck explained that he wanted to dress a little more formally for his final debriefing on Friday. Casey nodded and was actually reasonably patient while Chuck tried on a few different suits at a mall in Laurel. He couldn't afford much, but he bought an off the rack suit that he thought fit him pretty well, two dress shirts and two ties. He also got socks a belt and new dress shoes. In all it set him back about three hundred dollars, which was a lot for him. His bank account was definitely going to take a blow, this week, but it wasn't every month that your life changed this much. Besides, who knew what the future held? If was going to spend the rest of his life in a bunker, then he might as well spend his money. If he wasn't, hopefully he wasn't doomed to make eleven dollars an hour for the rest of his life.

Casey got him back to the hotel about four thirty and he debated trying to take a nap, but decided against it. He called Sarah's room to see what time she wanted to leave. She told him she would be ready by six and that she'd come knock on his door when she was ready. Sarah also asked if he had any particular plans and Chuck just told her to dress nicely.

Then in need of advice in a strange town, he did the only thing he could think of. He called the concierge. The concierge was more than happy to help him with planning an evening. He recommended the symphony which was apparently playing that night, but Chuck didn't have that kind of money and he wasn't even sure if Sarah would enjoy that or not.

After half an hour of negotiating and planning they settled on dinner at a restaurant in the capital and drink and dancing at a club not far from the restaurant, the concierge promised to have a cab waiting for them at six and wished him luck. The only problem was that Chuck had absolutely no idea what to tip a concierge. He supposed that would depend on how nice of a time Sarah had.

Realizing that he only had an hour to clean up, iron his new shirts and get ready, Chuck went into full panic mode to get himself ready before six.

***

At five minutes to six there was a knock on Chuck's door and he though perhaps Sarah was running ahead of schedule. But when he answered the door, there was a bellman with a large bouquet of flowers.

"For the gentleman's date this evening, compliments of the hotel."

Chuck was so momentarily stunned that he forgot to tip the bellman. He was still standing at the door scratching his head when there was another knock on the door. Chuck opened it up, still holding the flowers, to an absolutely stunning Sarah. Chuck's mouth hung open slightly as he stared at her.

"Hi, are those for me?" she asked. Chuck only nodded. "Wow, thank you, they're beautiful, but you shouldn't have. If we all end up going back to Los Angeles tomorrow I won't be able to take them with me."

"You, look beautiful." Chuck immediately realized this was a stupid thing to say, Sarah always looked beautiful.

"Thank you." Sarah's smile got a bit wider at the compliment.

"I mean…" Chuck stammered. "You always look really beautiful, but …I mean…God, you're stunning."

Sarah's smile turned into one of the grins he rarely saw. It only came out after they'd successfully completed a big mission, or on the rare occasions Chuck actually stayed in the car, it was the grin she gave when she was especially pleased with something. "You look pretty amazing yourself. Where'd the suit come from?"

"Oh, I, um, picked it up today…"

"Why?" Sarah asked.

"I wanted something nice to wear. You always look so fancy and I just wanted… Plus I wanted something to wear for the debriefing tomorrow. I get the feeling that General Beckman really doesn't like me very much."

"General Beckman doesn't really like anybody very much."

"She liked Roan Montgomery."

"Yes, well, maybe she likes one person." Sarah put her flowers down and straightened his tie, it was something she almost always did when he wore one, whether it needed it or not. "But if she doesn't like you, I guess that's her loss, because you are very likeable." Sarah finished her final inspection of him. "And very handsome."

Chuck couldn't help it, he blushed at her compliment. Even after three years she had the ability to make him feel like a giddy little kid. Chuck cleared his throat. "Do you want to go? We have a cab waiting."

"Oh, definitely, then. Can I leave these here?" Sarah asked.

"Sure."

She looped her arm through Chuck's and they walked to the elevator as a couple. They'd done this hundreds of times before of course, yet someone now it seemed different. Sarah wasn't uptight, the rigidness to her spine was gone. She seemed almost relaxed.

"Good evening, Mr. Carmichael." A bellman greeted them at the lobby. "You car is waiting."

As it turned out, instead of a cab, the concierge had arranged for a town car to take them to the restaurant. "Where are we headed?" Sarah asked.

"The Rosemont, madam," the driver replied as he helped her into the car.

When the driver closed the door behind Chuck, Sarah grasped his arm firmly and turned Chuck to face her. "This is all very fancy, but you didn't need to do all this for me."

Chuck shrugged slightly. "You've always deserved this, if I can only do it once…"

Sarah slipped her hand into his. "Chuck, I don't want tonight to be one long goodbye. Let's just pretend like this is our third attempt at our first date. Not that I didn't enjoy our other two real dates. I'm just hoping we can finally have a real date without an assassin showing up halfway through."

"I'm not sure how to end the evening, if someone doesn't try to kill us."

"That's easy," Sarah smiled. "You just give the old Bartowski eyebrow dance and then you start firing the guns at me." Sarah made her hands into pistols and started firing air bullets at him. Chuck blushed causing Sarah to laugh. "Just give me a kiss to remember and wish me a good night."

"A kiss, huh? That seems kinda forward, don't you think? After all this is our first date. How about a handshake?"

"If you value your arm, it had better be a kiss..."

Chuck leaned in close and Sarah's eyes got slightly wide, but she didn't back away. After a moment of hesitation she closed half the distance left between them an shut her eyes. Chuck mustered every bit of courage he'd gained over the last several years and closed the deal by gently pressing his lips to hers. It was short and not terribly intense, but it was electric. Chuck's lips tingled and he pulled away.

"Just to you know, take the pressure off of later," Chuck finally joked.

Sarah hummed a bit. "I don't know about that," her eyebrows danced for a second and Chuck laughed. He sat back and watched the famous buildings go by. The driver did a lap around the mall which Chuck was sure was at the request of the concierge.

***

Chuck and Sarah were seated in a booth. Chuck handed a disposable camera to the waiter and asked him to take their picture. Sarah gave Chuck a funny look after he took the camera back. "I want a picture to remember tonight by and you guys made me leave my phone at home."

"Sorry, we didn't want Ellie calling while you were in the middle of a test and not be able to explain why you were unavailable for hours at a time."

"I get it."

"Do you?"

"What?"

"Do you understand why you're here?"

Chuck took a deep breath. "Yeah, General Beckman's trying to decide whether or not to throw me in a bunker for the rest of my life."

"I'm not going to let her throw you in a bunker."

"What can you do though?"

"Whatever it takes," Sarah shrugged.

"So you're going to break me out?" Chuck asked.

"I'm going to do whatever it takes to keep you out of the bunker. If somehow you end up there anyway, then, yes, you should expect I'll come get you."

Chuck shook his head but he couldn't help the small smile that came over his face. "Would you really do that?"

"Count on it."

Chuck watched Sarah fiddle with her noodles for a bit, before he asked. "Why would you do that?"

"Because I care about you…and I think you've earned that."

"Earned it?"

Sarah scowled. "Yeah, how much money have you made from all the work you've done the last three years? How many times did we fail? How many times did you risk your life for mine or Casey's or somebody else's? I think you've earned a little loyalty."

"Is Friday really the last time I'm ever going to see you?"

Sarah smirked. "Are you going to miss me?"

Chuck's jaw dropped. "Miss you? Of course I'm going to miss you. I can't imagine my life without you."

Sarah reached across the table and took his hand. "I think you'll see me again."

"Well at the risk of quoting my brother-in-law, that's awesome." Sarah actually giggled at this and Chuck gave her fingers a squeeze. "So what do you think you'll be doing next week?"

"Looking for someplace to live."

"In…"

"D.C."

"You aren't going back out on a mission?" Chuck asked.

"It's been three years, I'm due about fifteen weeks vacation time at the very least. Plus if I'm going out on a another mission I should probably update my skills."

"You think you've gotten rusty?"

"Things change," Sarah shrugged. "I haven't done any serious sparring in a while."

"You train every day!" Chuck objected.

"My cardio, I haven't actually sparred with anyone in years." Chuck frowned and the tip of Sarah's fork dropped. "What?"

"It's just hard to think about you out there…risking your life and I'm not there."

"This is what I do."

Chuck nodded. As much as it pained him, he wasn't going to tell Sarah her life was too important to risk for anything. "So we've got more questions than answers don't we?" Chuck smirked.

"Sucks dating a spy doesn't it?"

"Best date I've ever been on."

Sarah's free hand that had been in his started stroking the back of his hand. "_You_ are a great guy, Chuck."

"But…?" Chuck prompted.

"There's no buts. Whatever happens this week, you should know that. That I believe it."

"Well you are an amazing woman and while you already know that, you should give your heart more credit. You deserve a life of happiness. I hope you take the time to experience that someday."

"Thank you," Sarah said softly.

Neither of them, seemed to be interested in eating anymore. The lump in Chuck's throat was making it hard to swallow. Sarah's eyes were sparkling but she was smiling as she maintained contact with his hand.

"Is there a problem with your orders?" The waiter asked.

"Oh, no, they're fine," Chuck replied glancing down at his partially eaten tortellini.

"If your meals are unsatisfactory, I would be happy to bring you something else," the waiter offered.

"It's okay," Chuck said. "I think we've just realized that we aren't very hungry."

"I see, I am sorry sir, I do hope you'll try the Rosemont again."

"Yeah, definitely, can we get our check?" Chuck asked.

"Sir, you hardly touched your food. Please allow the Rosemont to pay for your meal, just come back sometime when you have more of an appetite."

"Well, thank you very much. I'm sorry we weren't better company tonight," Chuck replied.

"No problem at all, sir."

The waiter left, and Chuck put a cash tip on the table for the waiter and escorted Sarah out of the restaurant.

"Where are we headed?" Sarah asked.

"Well, we are supposed to go dancing at a place down that way a bit. But we aren't due there for quite a while. Can you walk in those?"

Sarah shot Chuck a dirty look. "I could run a mile in them if I had too."

"Okay, well I wanted to ask before I suggest we walk around the mall a bit. I don't want you to hurt your feet."

"Where do you want to walk?"

"I was thinking we might take a quick cab ride over to the mall and walk around a bit. I've never been."

"We could go visit some of the monuments tomorrow, if you want. I was thinking I might take you to the Smithsonian, but if you'd prefer to wander through the monuments…"

"Really?" Chuck asked. "I thought you had to meet with General Beckman tomorrow?"

"I do, but not until the afternoon. I thought I might spend tomorrow morning with you, but we don't have to."

"I'd love to see the Smithsonian!"

"Well we can't see it all in a few hours," Sarah laughed.

"Still!"

They found a cab and took the four minute drive to the Washington Monument. They walked around it and started towards the Lincoln Memorial. Off in the distance they could see the White House. "Have you ever been in there?" Chuck asked, pointing to the White House.

Sarah shook her head. "No, I met President Bush once, but I've never been to the White House."

"Really, how did that happen?"

"Chuck…" Sarah said sardonically. "You know I can't tell you."

"You don't have to give me mission details, just clean it up for me, you know, no classified information."

"It was at a state dinner…he was visiting a foreign country and I was getting close to one of the other dignitaries there. The mark…he said he wanted to introduce me to someone and next thing I know President Bush is shaking my hand."

Chuck laughed. "That must have been odd meeting the President when on a mission in a totally different country."

"It was, I was petrified for a moment. I was armed and for a minute I was afraid the Secret Service was going to tackle me and blow my cover. After he turned around I realized how stupid that was and I spent probably my only chance to ever meet a sitting president afraid to talk or move."

"It's hard to imagine you being that frozen up." Sarah muttered something Chuck couldn't catch. "What was that?"

Sarah blushed. "I said, you've seen it before, several times infact."

"Like when?"

"You remember a couple of months ago, Ellie thought you were alone in your room and she walked in on me while I was removing my tactical gear? My first inclination was to throw a knife between her eyes, when I realized that wasn't going to work, I just froze. Luckily she was too embarrassed about walking in on us, to actually notice what I was wearing, but I definitely froze."

"I never would have guessed."

"That's what makes me a good spy I guess, I'm good at covering my slip ups. I've frozen plenty of times when you were in danger, luckily most of the time I can just let the training take over and it tells me what to do. That's what usually causes it, the disconnect between what my training is telling me to do and what my heart is telling me to do. The training is usually correct."

They had walked all the way to the Lincoln Memorial and Chuck stopped her and looked up at the statue of Lincoln. He looked at her. "What is your training telling you now?"

Sarah's breath caught and her eyes flickered to the left briefly, before she caught herself and looked back at Chuck's face. "That I'm too close, that I should put some distance between us, that I shouldn't be here."

"And what does your heart say?" Chuck asked.

Sarah's breathing grew rapid and in his hand he could feel her pulse speed up. "That I should figure how to get you to kiss me again."

"Now, I know why I like your heart so much," Chuck whispered and he bent down and kissed Sarah's top lip. She took the opportunity to tilt her head to the side and bring them closer. Her lips were teasing his, bringing him in closer as her arms slid around him. He wrapped his own arms around her. Even though he'd touched her hundreds of times over the years this was different, her skin felt hot beneath her dress and when he finally broke the kiss he kept his eyes closed and pressed her into a tight hug. She seemed to melt against him. He could smell the faint honey scent of her shampoo and the touch of perfume she rarely used.

"I think I'll remember that one," Chuck whispered.

"Mmmhhhmmm" Sarah hummed.

Even after Chuck loosened his grip Sarah continued to hold onto him for a few moments. Her eyes were glassy, but happy, when she finally pulled back from him. "Should we go over to the dance club now?" Chuck asked.

"Okay," Sarah agreed. "I am getting cold."

"Oh, here," Chuck took of his suit jacket and handed it to Sarah.

"Thanks," Sarah put it on and flipped her hair to free it from the color. The jacket hid most of her dress from view as she put it on as a wrap. They walked back to the main street and were able to get a cab before too long.

Dancing didn't turn out the way Chuck hoped. He still sucked. Sarah was still sexy. It wasn't as romantic as he was hoping for. It was mostly just him being sweaty and moving awkwardly. It was still fun, but then again, Captain Awesome throwing footballs into his produce section all afternoon would be fun for Chuck as long as Sarah was his date…so it was hard to judge it.

"Well that evening was kind of a bust wasn't it?" Chuck asked as they were riding back in the cab.

"I had a nice time," Sarah replied.

She was sitting impossibly far away on the other side of the cab's back seat and seemed distant. "Are you nervous about tomorrow?" Chuck asked.

"About going to the Smithsonian? Why would I be?"

Chuck laughed. "No that other little thing you have to do tomorrow."

"Oh, no, not really. What will be, will be."

"How very Yoda of you."

"What?"

"You know, the little green guy from Star Wars?" Chuck changed his voice. "Do or do not there is no try," Chuck quoted.

Sarah shook her head. "That was a long time ago, Chuck."

"Yes, in a galaxy far far away!"

"What?" Sarah laughed.

"Oh, you're such a Sci-fi dork." Chuck smirked.

Sarah frowned. "Does that bother you?"

"It's your life, you must choose your own path," Chuck replied.

"More Yodaisms?" Sarah asked.

"Not exactly. Hey, which part of the museum do you want to visit tomorrow?"

Sarah smiled indulgently. "Whichever you like."

"I think the air and space museum would be the neatest."

"Are you interested in space travel?" Sarah asked.

Chuck gave her, where have you been the last three years look. "Cha! I wanted to be an astronaut when I grew up."

"So instead you just didn't?" Sarah teased.

Chuck pouted. "Hey, go easy on my ego. It hasn't been the greatest of weeks."

"I'm sorry." Sarah reached over and rubbed his shoulder. "I've always enjoyed your boyish charm. It's sweet."

Chuck rolled his eyes. "Golly gee."

"I like sweet," Sarah said defensively.

"You seem more like the bad boy type to me."

Sarah looked at him thoughtfully. "I don't know, I'm not sure what my type is. Of course I can count on one hand the number of men I've considered forming an emotional connection too, so I'm really not sure I have a type."

They pulled into the parking lot of the hotel and Chuck was going to help Sarah out of the cab, but by the time he made it over to her door, she'd extracted herself. He did offer his arm and Sarah took it. He guided her back to his room at her insistence so she could retrieve her flowers. When he opened the door they found a bottle of chilled champagne and small container of strawberries.

"Well," Sarah said. "Someone sure thought they were getting lucky tonight."

Chuck's eyes simply wouldn't fit in his head as he stared at the champagne. "Sarah, you have to believe me, I swear to God, I didn't order that. I would never…I mean I wouldn't presume…I just…come on, I'm just not that cool!"

Sarah looked him over, examining him from head to toe. "All right, I believe you, where did it come from then?"

"I think the concierge is angling for a _really _big tip."

Sarah sniffed at one of the strawberries, apparently deciding it was free from poison she took a bite. "Mmmmmm," she moaned. "These are really good. You should have one."

Chuck laughed nervously. "Uh…yeah, okay."

"Ah, ah," Sarah said when Chuck moved to take one from bowl. She picked one up and peeled off the stem. She raised it to her mouth placed it in her teeth so that half of it was sticking out. She raised her eyebrows seductively and then she waited.

Chuck was frozen. Things like this simply didn't happen to him. The most real romantic moment he'd ever had was on a Ferris Wheel and he'd almost peed his pants. "Are you serious?" Chuck asked.

Sarah nodded slightly and reached out to grab Chuck's tie and pull him closer. He bent down slowly, making note of the fact that Sarah closed her eyes as he came in. Gently he closed his lips around the strawberry and bit off his half as Sarah moaned against his lips. He chewed exactly twice, his lips still pressed against Sarah's before she was kissing him. Her tongue teasingly removing the strawberry juice from his lips and Chuck grasped Sarah behind the head and locked them together. He kissed her for everything he was worth. His tongue trying to remember the exact texture of her tongue, he tried to remember the taste of the strawberry mixed with her lip gloss. She was so amazing and she was pushing him backwards towards the bed. He felt his legs hit it and he broke the kiss. "Sarah?" he asked.

"Yes, Chuck?" She asked her body pressed against his she looked up into his eyes.

"What's happening?"

"You have to ask?"

"Yeah, I really do."

Sarah was silent for a moment. "You know what goes really well with strawberries?" she asked. "Champagne." She turned and walked back to the cart with the champagne. Her hand was halfway to the bottle when Chuck spoke again.

"Sarah?" Her hand stopped.

"Yes, Chuck?"

"Look I've never felt about anyone the way I feel about you… Even if things have been different between us for the last year and a half, I still think you're the most amazing woman I've ever met. But, I didn't have any intention of seducing you tonight." Sarah's hand was frozen in mid air with her back turned to him. "As much as I can only dream what that would be like, being with you once…and then never seeing you again? I'm pretty sure that would kill me."

Sarah's hand dropped to her side. "Sorry," she said. "I guess I was lost in the moment."

"Don't be sorry," Chuck said walking over to her and turning her so he could hug her. "I really wish I was the kind of guy that could just do that and be happy because hey at least I got to once… I really do… I mean I really really _really, _do, but I don't need any more reasons to miss you."

Sarah grabbed him more tightly and he thought she might be crying. When she pulled back her eyes were puffy and she looked forlorn. "What the hell did you do to me?" she asked her voice cracking.

"What?" Chuck asked. "I didn't…"

"I never used to care about…things… I went in, got close to someone and I did the mission. That was it. I was the best. Complete. Emotional. Detachment. It was my specialty. What the hell did you do?" She asked angrily. Sarah picked up her purse and stomped towards the door, she flung it open and slammed it closed behind her.

Chuck looked at the door in stunned silence. "Well is that just the perfect end to Sarah and me?" he muttered. Chuck fell backwards on the bed and let out a long breath.


	5. Chapter 5 Sweet Misery

_**Disclaimer: **__Here I am, not owning Chuck. Woooo! Look at me, I don't own Chuck!!!_

Chapter 5: Sweet Misery

To say that Chuck did not sleep well, would be too make understatement into an art form. He didn't sleep at all. Which was a shame because he was exhausted to the point of collapse as it was, but he couldn't get the image of Sarah leaving his room crying out of his head. Every time he closed his eyes, that's all he saw.

He'd seen Sarah cry three times in the whole time he'd known her and one of those was at Ellie's wedding. The other, more troubling time; she'd been convinced that he was dead. At a quarter after eight Chuck grabbed the bottle of champagne and fifty dollars cash and walked down to the concierge's desk. Paul the man who'd helped him the evening before was with a customer who was getting directions to the zoo.

Paul wished her luck as she wandered off to try and navigate to the zoo. Chuck stepped up and handed the money to Paul. "Hey, thanks for your help last night. Everything was really nice."

Paul nodded. "Excellent, Mr. Carmichael, I'm glad to hear it."

"We didn't end up needing this, so I thought I would return it." Chuck said handing the bottle of Champagne to Paul.

"I'm sorry?" he said.

"The champagne and strawberries you sent to my room. It was really smooth, a little too smooth to be believable as me."

"I'm sorry, Mr. Carmichael, I didn't have anything other than some flowers sent to your room." Paul typed at the computer for a moment. "It appears the champagne is from room 518, a Ms. Sarah Walker?"

Chuck's eyebrows nearly launched off his head. "Sarah ordered them…but that means…" Chuck smacked his head. "Oh my God."

"Is there a problem, Mr. Carmichael?"

Chuck shook his head. "My life is soooo effed up." He thanked Paul again and went and had some breakfast. He was really quite hungry after not eating dinner the night before. He was feeling slightly better about things. Sarah had planned her move the night before. It wasn't just a whim, she'd really wanted to… Of course like an idiot he'd turned her down. Maybe if he'd been good enough, she'd have stayed.

He didn't know if he and Sarah were still on for today or not. She'd been hurting pretty badly when she left his room, but he wasn't going to leave it like that and he reasoned that they did have plans. So he knocked on her door, hoping she'd calmed down since last night.

When she opened the door she looked… well, she looked amazingly, stunningly, beautiful, but only because she couldn't help it. Her hair was pulled back into a ponytail she was wearing a long gray sweat shirt and jeans. There wasn't a drop of make-up on her face and she had dark black circles under her bloodshot eyes.

"Hi," Chuck said.

"Hi," she parroted.

"I'm sorry about last night."

"You don't have anything to apologize for," Sarah said sadly. "I'm the one that ruined our evening."

"You didn't ruin our evening," Chuck said softly. "I really wish I could have just…gone with the flow. I just can't imagine you and I only being a one night stand."

"I knew you wouldn't do it," Sarah shook her head. "Sometimes, it's hard to turn off the being a spy thing."

Chuck moved tentatively towards her and gave her a hug. She felt cold and somewhat lifeless, she didn't return the hug. "Are you still up for today?" he whispered. "We could just stay here, or find something else to do. You look really tired."

"I didn't sleep much."

"Yeah me either. It's okay, I'd rather just spend the day with you than tromping around the Air and Space museum, if you don't feel up to it."

"No, I need to get out of here. I'll go crazy if I spend any more time looking at these hotel room's walls. Can I have my flowers first?"

"Oh, sure, you still want them?"

"Of course, I was so mad at myself for leaving them last night..."

"You could have just come and asked for them."

"Chuck, I can barely face you now, there's no way I could have done it last night."

Sarah still wasn't looking at him and so he moved to wrap an arm around her and whisper into her ear. "Please don't be embarrassed, in so many ways that would have been an amazing dream come true. Don't take it as a bad thing that I care too much about you to ever put you in position where I felt like I took advantage of you. I can't tell you how much it's meant just that you're torn up about this mission ending."

Sarah rested her head against Chuck. "It was stupid and silly…"

"No it wasn't. Trust me, I was like ninety five percent putty in your hands, it was the other five percent that made me stop it."

"Can we, please, just forget it happened?" Sarah asked.

"If that's what you want, then sure." Chuck replied. He was still holding Sarah in a tight embrace and she wasn't fidgeting at all. Normally hugging Sarah was like hugging a wild animal. She'd humor you for a minute, but you could feel her discomfort and if you didn't let her go quickly, she might take your arm off. Right now she seemed content to stand there and let Chuck hug her forever and honestly he wasn't against the prospect. If she wanted to stand here and let Chuck make up for all the times he wanted to hug her but couldn't over the last three years, he'd be totally fine with that.

"We should get going," Sarah said, although she still hadn't moved to pull away from him. She eventually raised her arms and gave Chuck a quick squeeze before pulling away. Reluctantly, Chuck released her.

They stopped by his room quickly so Sarah could transfer her flowers to her own room. Chuck picked up his disposable camera and they were off.

The Smithsonian was fascinating. Chuck, never having spent much time outside of LA hadn't experienced anything quite like this. Los Angeles did have museum's but they didn't feel like walking into history when you visited. Plus the scale was unbelievable, everything seemed either way bigger or way smaller than he thought it would. The World War II era planes didn't look like anything he'd want to fly in. Sarah was indulgent about Chuck's fascination with things, as he inspected little details about the different aircraft.

When they got to the lunar module exhibit, Chuck only had a couple of pictures left on his disposable and he wanted a picture of the two of them together. He asked a very nice couple with a Midwest accent if they'd take his and Sarah's picture in front of the lunar module.

"Chuck," Sarah grumbled quietly so that only could hear. "I don't want my picture taken, I look like crap."

Chuck frowned at her. "Come on, the idea that you even could look like crap is as preposterous as me looking sexy. I want a picture of you here with me, it's not like I get you to voluntarily hang out with me every day."

"Hey, you can look sexy and I definitely look like crap." Sarah was turned away from the camera and seemed to be ignoring the couple.

"One second," Chuck asked the couple and smiled apologetically. "Please, Sarah?"

"All right, fine. But this photo is to be hidden in the bottom of a closet somewhere. If I find out you put it on your wall I'm tracking you down and removing your fingers and I know how important your fingers are to you."

Chuck gulped. "Okay…" They posed quickly and the couple gave them back their camera and then fled. "I think you scared them."

Sarah shoved Chuck. "It's your fault."

All too soon Sarah announced she had to get back and get ready for her appointment in the afternoon. Chuck really didn't want to go; these were perhaps the last moments of his friendship with Sarah. Tomorrow he'd go back to LA or to a bunker somewhere and she'd be gone. His lifeline, the only thing that kept him sane the last three years was snapping. Damn it, he felt like crying. He managed to hold things together until they got back to the hotel and Sarah gave him a peck on the cheek.

"You know you have to stay in the hotel the rest of the day?" Sarah asked. "Casey and I will both be gone."

"I know."

"Okay, call me if there's any trouble."

"I know."

She gave him another peck on the cheek. "I'm not sure when I'll be back, but I'll see you tomorrow for sure."

Sarah started walking back down the hallway to her own hotel room. "Sarah?" Chuck called after her.

"Yeah?" Sarah asked spinning around.

The words caught in Chuck's throat. He couldn't think of one relevant thing to say to make this less awful. "Have a good meeting."

Sarah nodded. "Thanks." She gave him a weak smile and disappeared in her room. Chuck walked into his own room and flopped down on the bed. It was over, that was probably his last private moment with her and he told her to have a good meeting. When the tears started coming again, he chose not to fight.


	6. Chapter 6 The Walker Gambit

_**Disclaimer**__: If you've learned one lesson by now I hope it's to don't do drugs!. If you have time for one more lesson, please realize that I do not own Chuck. _

Chapter 6: The Walker Gambit

Chuck got up early and put on his suit. Today was the day. Today was the last day of whatever life he'd started when he'd clicked on that email. It seemed almost odd that Bryce wasn't here. He hadn't talked to Bryce in more than a year, but it seemed like since he started this, it would be only fitting for him be here to finish it. Honestly, Chuck couldn't tell how he felt about the situation as a whole. He'd spent much of the last three years completely miserable, scared and in danger. But without them, he might never have gotten over what happened at Stanford.

He had a completely different feeling about Stanford now. Instead of hating Bryce for betraying him and getting him thrown out, he hated the whole experience. He hated Stanford for allowing Bryce to be put into that situation. He hated that the CIA wouldn't have offered him a choice. He hated that Jill was Fulcrum and he hated that, she could be pulled into such an organization while attending college. Chuck definitely hated himself for not noticing while they were dating. He should have known, he should have been able to tell. He could have saved her, like Bryce saved him.

The thing Chuck dreaded about this meeting, was that Chuck never got what he wanted. All he wanted when he was a fifth grader was for his Mom to come home. All he'd wanted as a teenager was for his Dad to have an interest in him. All he'd wanted in college was to have a good time and graduate. And all he wanted now was to get his pathetic life before the Intersect back. He wanted to go home and start over with Ellie, Devon and Morgan and possibly Sarah if she was interested. That's how he knew for sure that it was never going to happen.

The knock came on Chuck's door exactly when he expected. God forbid Agent Casey was two minutes late for something. "Hi, Casey."

"Chuck." Casey nodded.

"Where's Sarah?" Chuck asked.

"Agent Walker did not return with me yesterday. She had personal matters to take care of and is making her own way to the meeting."

"But she is coming, right?"

"Yes, Chuck, Sarah will be there." Casey replied softly. Much too softly for Chuck's liking, nothing could be good about Casey being 'nice.'

Chuck swallowed with difficulty. "Let's get this over with."

"Grab your bags, we aren't coming back," Casey ordered him.

For some reason, that sounded ominous, but Chuck dutifully returned to his room and packed his last few toiletries into his bag. Chuck followed Casey down to the lobby to check out.

They made the drive Fort Meade in silence. When they were right outside the front doors Casey stopped Chuck. "Be smart today. Don't volunteer any information you don't have to. Be as honest as you can be, but for God sake, make sure General Beckman knows you wouldn't give up the Intersect secrets no matter what. This is about protecting the information in your head. General Beckman considers that information to be way more important than you are; she needs to be sure it's safe. You have to make her feel that information is safe." Before Chuck could even ask a question, Agent Casey was once again striding towards the huge black building.

Chuck soon had a bright yellow visitors badge proclaiming him to be Charles Carmichael visitor. As soon as Chuck stepped into the lobby of General Beckman's office, Mrs. Young ushered them in. "The General is waiting for you."

Casey pushed the door open and they stepped into General Beckman's office. Sarah and the General were seated at the conference table. "Good, you're here. Have a seat gentleman." Chuck shot Sarah a quick smile but she wore a solemn mask over her normally expressive features.

"I went over details of this mission with Agents Walker and Casey yesterday, Mr. Bartowski, so I'll spare you and myself another rehashing. Suffice it to say, that the mission against all odds was deemed a success. As I'm sure you no doubt aware, I've been of the opinion that you should have been secured long ago. Only the protests of the agents in the field and a mostly stellar string of successful missions kept me from completing that order. Indeed the agents assigned to you have proven to be unbelievably loyal to you and by that I mean that _I don't believe_ that it's caused by just your _good looks and charm." _The General gave him a very sour look.

"I have been completely unable to determine the source of your hold on Agents Walker and Casey. I don't suppose you'd care to enlighten me as to how exactly you compromised not one but two of what were some of the best agents in the employ of the U.S. Government?"

Chuck's mouth was very dry. He wished desperately that there was water for him to drink. General Beckman's eyes were boring into him and he looked at Casey and then at Sarah, but it was clear neither was going to come to his rescue. "I, uh, I don't know, I was nice to them?" Chuck tried.

"How very _quaint_." General Beckman was clearly not impressed with his answer. She glared at him for a few moments. It seemed to stretch on endlessly until Chuck was sure she'd been staring at him for minutes. "What do you want out of life, Mr. Bartowski?"

Chuck didn't know how to answer that, going back to the Buy More didn't seem like a safe or smart answer. "I don't know, I mean it's been such a long time since what I wanted even mattered." Both Sarah and Casey cringed at this and Chuck guessed it was the wrong answer. "But, you know I'd like to get a real job, something that pays more than twelve dollars an hour and spend some time with my family without lying to them all the time. Maybe settled down and start a family eventually… I really don't know. Just something that matters I guess."

"Do you wish to serve your country?" General Beckman asked.

"Like how?" Chuck asked. He was honestly confused.

"Sometimes people must make sacrifices. They sacrifice something of themselves to make the country a better place. Are you one of those people?"

"General I think I _have_ sacrificed for my country. It may not seem like much to you, but I've given three years to this Intersect project for no more reason than Bryce Larkin sent me an email. I wasn't trained. I haven't been paid. I've mostly tried not to complain about the impositions put on my life, now you're asking me if I want to give more?"

General Beckman frowned. "I suppose you have a point, but don't forget that the CIA and NSA have provided you topflight protection service for three years—"

"And made me go out on missions and risk my life," Chuck interrupted.

"As I was saying we have provided you protection services in place, when it would have been easier to remove you. We did this to preserve what we could of your normal life."

"You did it to gain my cooperation." Chuck pointed out.

General Beckman was becoming agitated and Agent Casey's eyes looked like they might pop out of his head at any moment.

"I see," General Beckman sighed.

"Mr. Bartowski, I find myself in a very difficult position. That is not your concern, it is my job to make difficult decisions, however my options are very limited. On one hand, I have the security of an entire nation, on the other, the life and happiness of one citizen. Now, obviously my inclination is to protect the many at the sacrifice of the one." Chuck gulped. "However, the one has been a valuable asset to the many and the one is protected by agents who report to me. The problem with this, is that I can no longer be sure where the loyalties of my agents lay. You see both Agents Walker and Casey have made strong cases, that your life and freedom be preserved. I can see no reason for this, the right call is put you in a secure facility until you no longer represent a danger to yourself or others. Yet we continue to go around and around. Now with two trusted and loyal agents I would simply declare my intentions and they would deal the consequences. The problem Mr. Bartowski, is that I'm no longer sure what the loyalties of my agents are. I issue them orders and instead of following them, they interpret them, forget them, or argue. I have seriously considered trying to replace them, with agents I know will follow the instructions I give, but there are two problems with that.

"I suspect both of the agents in question would deny my order and work to prevent replacement agents from taking their places. I'm not sure they would be restrained in their means of prevention. Secondly, such actions would pit them against the very agencies they work for. Thus forming what could only be considered a rogue cell, with access to an extremely dangerous intelligence asset." The General paused. "You see my problem, Mr. Bartowski."

Chuck had no idea what to say. General Beckman seemed to indicate that Casey and Sarah were refusing orders from her. It wasn't really something he could see either of them doing. The only thing that indicated it was even a possibility from Sarah was she had insisted she would keep him out of a bunker or from coming to any harm, but Casey…Casey never refused orders. "Why are you telling me all this?" Chuck asked.

"I suppose I'm telling you this to make it clear that today we teeter on the edge of a knife, Mr. Bartowski. On either side we have disaster. Your handlers have continued to push an objective that I find intolerable. However, we lack options, Mr. Bartwoski. I hope you appreciate the sacrifices being made for you.

"Effective today Agent Walker has been removed from field operations and has been permanently assigned to your protection detail. You will be returning to California to settle your affairs and pack your personal belongings. You will move to a secured community in Severna Park and commute daily to your job here at the NSA headquarters. You will maintain contact with Agent Walker on a 24x7 basis. If the two of you lose contact, I will issue an immediate termination order for you. This arrangement is to last for no less than ten years. Do you understand, Mr. Bartowski?"

Chuck's eyes had grown larger and larger. "You mean I have to move here?" Chuck asked.

"Yes."

"What do you mean Agent Walker has been removed from field operations?"

"I mean, Agent Walker has given up her career as a field operative to become your full time babysitter. Was I somehow unclear?"

"Sarah," Chuck had been watching her off and on throughout the General's remarks, but her face remained a stoic mask. "I don't want you to have to do this."

"It's okay, Chuck." Sarah replied.

"It's not okay!" Chuck objected. "You can't give up your life for me!"

"I share your sentiments, Mr. Bartowski, believe me, but I am not Agent Walker's boss and she has made her commitment to this action quite clear. If you would prefer to voluntarily report to Desperate Plains…"

"Those are my choices?" Chuck asked. "I have to ruin my life or hers?"

General Beckman looked at him impassively. "As I said, sacrifices need to be made. This was the only compromise that proved at all acceptable between all parties."

"Sarah?" Chuck looked at her desperately, he needed to talk to her about his.

"I told you, I would keep you out of a bunker. This is what was necessary, take the deal," Sarah implored.

"I don't want you forced to watch me…for ten years…" Chuck sighed. "This is crazy. What's happening to Casey?"

"As Major Casey is apparently unwilling to follow my orders, I have remanded him back to the Air Force to finish his commitment to the armed forces. At the end of his current tour next spring he will be discharged," General Beckman explained.

"You did this, John?" Chuck asked. Casey shrugged, but didn't reply.

"I cannot stress to you enough the sacrifices that have been made by all parties." General Beckman reiterated. "I suggest, you agree, now. The terms are not going to change. If you are not prepared to sign this agreement," General Beckman removed a document from the folder in front of her. "You will be arrested. I'm not sure of the outcome of that action, but I can assure you, it won't be good for any of us."

General Beckman slid the document over and Chuck scanned it. It seemed to be the basic outline that the General had explained. It did lay out his salary and some other arrangements. "Sign it," Sarah urged.

Chuck picked up the pen in front of him and signed the agreement. Sarah gave him an encouraging smile and signed the agreement next to his name. General Beckman then took it last and signed it.

"I hate you," Chuck told General Beckman. Both Sarah and Casey's eyes immediately shot towards him.

"I am sorry you feel that way, Mr. Bartowski, I have a very difficult job. I can't be best friends with everyone. Major Casey, you will escort Mr. Bartowski, back to Los Angeles to collect his personal affects and to assist in cementing his cover with his relatives. Upon your return you will report to Elmendorf Air Force base. Agent Walker, I have Director Cummings standing by. You should be released to take care of your personal affairs by two this afternoon. Gentleman, have a good flight." General Beckman stood indicating that the meeting was over.

"Can I talk to Sarah for a minute?" Chuck asked to nobody in particular. General Beckman who'd been stepping away stopped short.

"Excuse me?" she growled.

"I'll call you," Sarah told him. "I'm not exactly sure when, but I will. Tell, Ellie, I'm sorry I'm not there."

"If you're quite through," General Beckman said viciously.

Chuck sighed and Casey led him out of General Beckman's office. When the door was closed behind them. Chuck said, "Casey, I'm so…"

"Don't!" Casey replied bitingly.

Casey stomped towards the elevators as Chuck trailed along to behind him.

***

Casey still didn't want to talk in the car, nor did he want to talk at the airport. When Chuck had him cornered on the plane, he tried again. "Casey, I'm sorry."

"You've always been a sorry excuse for a man, what exactly are you sorry for now?"

"That you lost your job… I can't believe you'd stick up for me like that."

"I think you're over stating your importance in all this. General Beckman and I had a general disagreement that we could not work past. That's all. If you can't respect your boss then you can't work for them."

"What did you guys disagree about?"

Casey glared at him but didn't answer. So Chuck asked another question. "Why is Sarah doing this?"

"You'll have to ask Agent Walker about her motivations, she and I haven't discussed it. I think she's being stupid, but I admire her commitment to the mission. I have to assume she let her girl feelings get in the way."

"What should she have done?"

"Let you live in the bunker, it's only ten years."

"Could you do a ten year prison sentence?" Chuck asked.

"Easy," Casey huffed. "Did you know that I was once captured and tortured by the Taliban? What the hell are a few years in a cushy detention facility?"

Chuck sighed. "I just wish Sarah would have talked to me about this first."

"Why can't you just be grateful," Casey snarled. "Do you have any idea what she's given up for you? Do you even know, that she used to be regarded as the best? She was my partner, the best partner I ever had and now she's finishing her career babysitting the world's largest boob." Casey put his head phones on and proceeded to ignore Chuck the rest of the way to Los Angeles.


	7. Chapter 7 I Guess This is Goodbye

Chapter 7: I Guess This is Goodbye

Through the wonder of jet travel. Chuck arrived only a couple of hours after they left Washington. That gave him enough time to start organizing his stuff. He called Morgan and asked him to come over for dinner. Then he left messages for Ellie and Awesome and asked them to come over. Chuck hoped they could make it, he really didn't want to do this again and again. He wanted to just tell everyone one at once and get it over with. Chuck knew he'd have to go to work tomorrow and turn in his tie, but first he'd raid the store for boxes.

He took down his Dune poster and sealed inside the blueprint case. It was still a collector's item even if he doubted Sarah would ever let him put it up again. Sarah, he was going to be living with Sarah. They were going to live in a house together.

Chuck was so confused. Just this morning he'd been sure Sarah would be out of his life forever in a matter of hours. Now she was on some sort of permanent body guard duty. They'd talked all week about the end of the assignment and she hadn't said anything. She hadn't said anything the previous morning when they'd gone to the Smithsonian. Chuck considered her actions at the end of their date. She'd been looking for a fling, if she'd succeeded would she have let him go to the bunker without looking back? Did she sacrifice herself for him, because she loved… Chuck shook his head. They cared about each other, they had for a long time, but love? Sarah didn't really seem the type to throw away her career for love. She just wasn't that emotional. There was something else at work here, but all Chuck could figure out was that she'd thrown away her career to keep him out of the bunker. She was giving up ten years of her life, so that he didn't have to.

He would never ask her to do that. Couldn't she just have talked to him first? How could he even look her in the face knowing she'd thrown away her life to protect him? Chuck always knew she'd sacrifice her life to protect the Intersect, but this… It wasn't right and Chuck had no way to fix it. She'd practically forced him sign the agreement. Now if they were apart he'd be killed. Chuck threw the shirt he was folding on the bed a collapsed on top of it. This was just too messed up.

Chuck had to talk to her. He hit the speed dial on his phone for her. After a moment he got a tone. _"The cellular user you have dialed is no longer available. If you feel you reached this message in error, please try your call again."_ Chuck stared at his phone. She'd changed her number? Chuck bolted up from his bed.

"Casey, Casey, Casey!" Chuck pounded on the door of the apartment across the hall.

"WHAT?" Casey barked as he ripped open the door.

"I called Sarah's phone, it says the number's no longer valid."

"You called her already? It's been what, like eight hours since you've seen her? Grow a pair of stones, Bartowski."

"Casey, her number's not working!"

"Relax, geek, standard CIA protocol, they're burning as much of her cover ID as they can. They do this at the end of every mission. They're trying to make the two of you harder to track. Guess what, you'll be getting a new number too."

"But…" Chuck sputtered. "5-25 1977 is the exact date that Star Wars was released! I can't change my number!

"Cripes, Bartowski, every time I think you can't get any more pathetic." Casey slammed the door in his face.

***

Ellie's anticipation was tangible. They ended up having pizza, because, well…Chuck didn't cook. He settled everyone down on the couch. "I'm thinking you guys have probably guessed I have some news."

Ellie was practically bouncing on the couch cushions. "It's about D.C. isn't it, what happened?"

"Well Sarah got a new job and she's not coming back," Chuck started.

"Ooh, Chuck," Ellie frowned.

"But, I've…we've decided…that I'm going to move out there with her."

"Oh my God!" Ellie screamed.

"You can't be serious!" Morgan cried outrage. "You're leaving?"

Ellie launched off the couch and gave Chuck a tight hug.

"Awesome job, bro, I knew you had it in you," Devon congratulated him.

"Had what in him, insanity?" Morgan protested. "Chuck, you can't move clear across the country."

"Of course he can," Ellie countered shooting Morgan a withering glare. "They're in love. Are you going to ask her to marry you?" Ellie asked excitedly.

Chuck put his hands on Ellie's shoulders to try and calm her down. "Ellie, no, relax, we're just going to be living together."

"Whew, man, you really had me scared for a minute there," Morgan sighed. "Sure, you'll go out there, give this thing a try and if it doesn't work, well then your job at the Buy More will be here for you."

"Morgan, I'm not coming back," Chuck shook his head.

"See!" Ellie jumped excitedly. "This is serious!"

"It's not what you think…" Chuck started.

"How can you be moving in together for good and this not be serious?" Ellie asked.

"It's complicated, we're taking it slow."

"Oh, I swear to God, everything with you two is slow and complicated! Just love each other already! You should just propose Chuck…you guys could have a beautiful wedding…"

"Ellie, stop. We aren't…I'm not…Sarah and I…we are like that," Chuck tried to explain.

"Yeah, man, don't tie yourself down. First you get married and then the next thing you know she's gone half the time."

Chuck shook his head. "This isn't about you and Anna either Morgan. It's just… well it's hard to explain."

"Oh!" Ellie started bouncing again. "I'm so excited, where is she? Why didn't she come with you so you could to tell us together?"

"She's in D.C. getting things together."

"Oh, I have to call her, we have so much to talk about!"

"Uh, you can't call her right now, El…"

"Why not?"

"It's late there."

"It's only a quarter to ten, I'm sure she's still up."

"She's getting a new phone, I tried calling her earlier but her old number isn't working," Chuck tried.

"Oh, well you'll give me her new number, right?" Ellie asked.

"Sure, I'll let you know as soon as I get our new numbers."

"Your new number?" Morgan gasped. "No more Star Wars?" Chuck shook his head. "Can I have it?" he exclaimed.

"Yeah, sure buddy." Chuck nodded.

Devon had been mostly silent, but he stood and gave Chuck a backslapping hug. "I think it's great, Chuck. You're going to love this, moving in is so rewarding. And don't worry, when it's time to take that next step, you'll know."

"Thanks, Devon."

"Oh, man, Dad's gunna flip out," Morgan shook his head. "Oh and Anna, I have to call Anna, she won't believe it."

"Yeah, I'll go talk to Big Mike tomorrow, I know he won't be happy but…"

"I'll talk to Dad, don't worry about it. I mean he'll be upset, but we'll sort something out."

"It still freaks me out when you call him dad." Chuck shuttered.

"Well he married my Mom, that's what he wanted me to call him. Plus I've never had a Dad before."

"I'm happy for you, it's just weird. Who are you going to promote to replace me?" Chuck asked.

"I'm not sure, probably Skip." Morgan shook his head.

"Not Lester?" Chuck asked.

"Come on, Chuck, you know Lester's never been the same since Jeff died. He's a complete burn out now.

"He's gotten better…"

Morgan shook his head. "Honestly, I don't even think he'd want it."

***

Chuck and Morgan sat on his balcony. Looking at the courtyard below. "I can't believe it man I just can't believe it. What's Chewie without Han Solo around?"

"Morgan, for cripes sake your married!" Chuck objected. "You don't need me around to be something. You'll still have Anna."

"I know, it's just, we've been best buds since the second grade…"

"We'll still be friends, we just won't get to hang out much."

"I guess, it's just hard to imagine my life without you in it."

"Maybe you and Anna should think about having kids." Chuck suggested.

"Whoah, no way, I admit I caved on the whole getting married thing, but no way are we having kids!"

"Oh, come on, Morgan, you know Anna wants to and you can actually afford it now that your assistant manager and Anna got that job in the Taiwanese Cultural Attaché's office."

"No chance, I'm not having a kid until I'm ready to stop being a kid."

"Well I guess the Grimes line is doomed then." Chuck smirked.

"One step at a time, man, first your pressure me to take the assistant managers job, then you pressure me to get married and now kids? What about you man, why haven't you and Sarah tied the knot?"

Chuck shook his head. "We have a very weird relationship. I don't think she and I will ever get there."

"Why not?" Morgan asked.

"We just aren't that intimately connected. There's always been this wall between us."

"I don't get it, dude. Then why go to D.C.?"

"Some things a person just has to do, this is one of those things."

"Like a quest?"

"Something like that."

***

Chuck walked into Big Mike's office his tie hand. He'd considered this moment for a long time. He wasn't sure it would ever come. "Hi, Big Mike, you have a minute?"

"Bartowski, Morgan told me something disturbing about you this morning."

"Oh really?"

"He said you're quitting to follow that dame to Washington D.C." Chuck nodded. "That's a damn shame, Bartowski. You're one of the finest employees this branch has had during my time as manager."

"Thank you, sir."

"I can't believe your leaving me alone with these animals."

"Sir, you have Morgan…"

"Oh, come on, Bartwoski, he's one of them. I had to promote him, otherwise Belognia would have made my life a living hell."

"Er…" Chuck replied.

"I'll make sure the guys do something nice for you."

"That's not necessary," Chuck tried.

"Nonsense, eight years, that's a hell of a long time, we need to show you some appreciation."

"I was wondering, if I could have some boxes…"

"Sure, Chuck, take whatever you need."

"Thanks."

Chuck put his keys and his tie on Big Mike's desk and turned around. Outside of Big Mike's office Morgan had rallied the Buy More employees and they were standing shoulder to shoulder at attention. When Chuck walked out of the office, Morgan started clapping and so did the rest of the Buy More employees. The handful of customers in the store where obviously confused by the commotion. Chuck took a moment and shook the hands of each person as he walked down the line until he got to the end where Morgan, Lester, Skip and Renee enveloped him in a group hug.

"I knew you would one day escape this place," offered Lester. "Please go make sweet passionate love to that woman as many times as you can. Do it for us."

"Ew, gross," Renee complained.

"Boss," Skip said emotionally. "I… you're the best Nerd Herd supervisor a guy could have ever asked for."

Chuck heard Big Mike's voice from his office. "All right you slackers," he called softly. "Get back to work."

***

Chuck dove for his phone when it started ringing. It came up caller unknown on the screen. "Hello?"

"Hi, Chuck."

"Sarah!" Chuck let out a deep breath.

"How's it going?" Sarah asked.

"I don't know," Chuck replied. "I'm so confused."

"About what?"

"Why did you do this?"

There was silence on the end of the phone for a long time before Sarah replied. "Do you remember when the Beta Intersect was completed?"

"Sure."

"Well, Casey didn't tell me right away, but about eight months after that, he sat me down and told me that Beckman had given him a termination order for you. He was supposed to kill you as soon as the new Intersect was online." Chuck wanted to say something, but for the life of him he couldn't figure out what. "He didn't tell me until after he decided he wouldn't do it if Beckman ordered him to again."

"He was going to kill me?"

"It takes a lot for someone like Casey to disobey a direct order. He's career military, they don't just refuse orders. Anyway, he told me because he wanted to come up with a plan to save you and he knew I'd help. Casey was in favor of talking Beckman into the bunker, but I wouldn't go along with that. I wasn't going to allow it. We started working on Beckman the moment she told us that they'd started testing this new device. Casey's plan was to get you a job at the NSA, so you'd be valuable. Plus the NSA would be more inclined to provide you protection if you worked directly for them. He knows how smart you are and he was sure you could be an asset. Beckman wasn't listening. It was a struggle just to convince her to test you. Casey put his job on the line and Beckman took it. The thing was, even after we got you tested and you did great. I mean you really did great, I'm so proud of you. Beckman still wasn't going for it. She'd moved off of killing you, but she wanted to put you in the bunker.

"I fought with her about it and this was the solution we came up with. I know it's not perfect, but it's the best I could do. I'm sorry I couldn't talk to you about it before. I really didn't know what was going to happen until Thursday night. Then I had to go convince my bosses. I'm sorry."

Chuck was silent. He had questions, but he couldn't believe they still wanted to kill him. After all the things he'd done, after all good he did, they were just going to kill him?

"Chuck?" Sarah asked.

"Sorry…" Chuck mumbled. "I guess I should be thanking you, I just can't believe it."

"You don't have to thank me." Sarah sighed. "I know this isn't what you wanted. It was just the best I could do."

"I…" Chuck started. "I want you to know that I didn't want this for you. I mean, yeah for a long time I'd hopped you stay, but I didn't want it to be because you were protecting me."

"It's okay," Sarah replied. "I like looking out for you."

"But ten years, Sarah your whole career. You must hate me."

"Chuck, I could never hate you. It won't be bad, you'll see. We're going to find a way to make this work."

"Thank you," Chuck replied.

"So I've got news."

"More news?"

"Well, not quite as Earth shattering as the last news. I have our house, we officially have an address. I have our new phone numbers. The thing is you can give them to Ellie and Morgan, but not anybody else. We need to leave as small a trail as we can without being suspicious. You also need to setup a new email address."

"Okay,"

There was silence on both ends of the call for a few moments. "I guess that's it," Sarah said. "I'll see you in a few days?"

"Sarah," Chuck said.

"Yes?"

"I wish I knew what to say to make this right. I'm really confused and…and scared and I…I just don't want you to hate me. I don't think I could handle it, if you hated me."

"Chuck, I could never hate you. I sincerely hope you believe that."

"Thanks."

"Just get here and we'll work all this out, it won't be bad, I promise." There was another awkward silence and Sarah added. "I'll see you soon."

"Okay," Chuck sighed.

***

He rolled over, it was only a little after seven but he was never going to be able to go back to sleep. This was ridiculous how was he supposed to be okay with this?

What the hell was waiting for him in Washington? Was Sarah his roommate? His cover girlfriend, is friend? Chuck shook his head. This wasn't right. The movers were coming today to pack up his stuff and haul it to Washington. He'd be spending the next two night's at Ellie and Devon's before he left. Casey wanted them to stay in a hotel, but Chuck promised he could stay out of trouble for two nights. He wasn't sure if or when he'd get to see Ellie again and he wanted to spend as much time with her as he could before he left.

The other odd thing was that all of Chuck's personal stuff and photos had been removed yesterday. The movers were not allowed to know who they were moving. So his pictures and personal papers were shipped in a sealed container. Agent Casey would oversee the moving crew, Chuck had to be gone by ten. Chuck was supposed to spend one last day in the Castle before it was stripped down and removed as well. Tonight was Chuck's going away party with his Buy More friends, he didn't feel like going, he just wasn't prepared to leave his life behind.

After Chuck showered Casey drove him over to the Orange Orange. "Stay out of trouble," Casey ordered.

"Right, thanks," Chuck replied sarcastically. As soon as Chuck slammed the door Casey roared away. Casey had been even more intolerable that usual since they'd come back, only Chuck couldn't blame him. He was being sent to air base in Alaska in response to supporting Chuck.

Chuck spent the day wallowing the relative safety of the Castle. That night he went out for drinks with the Buy More crew. Even Casey came, which Chuck found a little odd because technically Casey had quit before Chuck. They had a relatively good time, until Big Mike got drunk and started making out with Morgan's mother in the middle of the restaurant. That kind of killed the festive mood.

"I can't believe it," Morgan moaned. "My best buddy, clear across the country. This is rotten luck."

"You've still got Anna," Chuck pointed out.

"It's not the same, OUCH!" Morgan cried as Anna, who'd been stroking his hair extracted a handful from his scalp. "Sorry, honey, I just mean it's different. Chuck's always been like a super hero he could do anything."

Anna resumed stroking Morgan's hair. "I understand. But Chuck also doesn't do that think you like so much."

Morgan shivered. "That's an excellent point." Morgan enveloped Chuck in a tight hug. "Take care of yourself, man. Call me every day."

"Morgan, I can't do that."

"Okay, well…email me every day. We'll play BattleTech all night!"

"No you won't," Anna interjected in a sing song voice. "Okay, well, when Anna's out of town we'll play all night!"

Chuck grinned. "Sure, I have to go, Casey's giving me a ride back to Ellie's."

"I still don't see what you see in that guy." Morgan shook his head.

"Live long and prosper!" Morgan held up his hand in a V.

"Qapla'!" Chuck replied, meeting his fist with an open palm and bowing.

"You're still really cool, Chuck!" Anna tugged Morgan away and Chuck watched them go.

He walked back to Casey's car. Casey took him back to Ellie and Awesome's for his last two days with Ellie.

***

Ellie had been hugging him for a solid five minutes. Not that Chuck minded particularly he didn't really want to leave. Once he left he had no idea how long it would be before he'd make it back here. "I have to go," Chuck sighed.

"I'm so proud of you," Ellie whispered as she tightened her grip.

"I'm just moving in with a girl, Ellie. It's not exactly the Nobel Prize for physics."

"Who cares about the Nobel Prize for physics? You and Sarah are finally moving in! I'm so happy, but I'm going to miss you."

"I'm going to miss you too."

Ellie pulled back and looked at him. "Chuck, you better wipe that frown of your face before you see Sarah… If you hurt her, I swear to God, I'll…"

"Easy, El, Chuck's just a little melancholy about moving on, he'll be fine by the time he gets to D.C. Right, buddy?" Awesome pounded him on the back.

"Right," Chuck agreed. "I'll be fine when I see her."

"Good," Ellie nodded.

"You better get going, before you miss your flight."

"Bye, guys," Chuck said sadly.

"It's going to awesome, Chuck, you'll see. Have a good flight. Living with the girl that makes your trouser snake dance is so rewarding. Ow!" Awesome rubbed his shoulder where Ellie had smacked him.

"You'll enjoy it, because you love each other," Ellie assured him before she shot Devon another glare. "I guess this is it…" Ellie gave him one more hug and lost her battle to contain her tears. After one more teary goodbye Chuck got in the cab and headed off to a new life.


	8. Chapter 8 Mr And Mrs Carmichael

_**Disclaimer: **__Chuck is owned by those wonderful people over at NBC. Please see them for all of your Chuck marketing needs as I'm not making a profit from this and can't sell you any Chuck merchandise. _

Chapter 8: Mr. and Mrs. Carmichael

Chuck wandered over to the TSA queue and waited in the security line. After he'd made it through security he turned the corner and ran into Casey. "I think I like traveling with Sarah better," Chuck observed. "She doesn't make me go through security."

"Yeah, well the TSA gets all excited to see real live CIA operatives, the NSA doesn't get special treatment from Homeland Security. So you'll just have to deal."

"You mean you aren't armed?" Chuck asked.

Casey shook his head. "Nope, I turned in my weapon this morning. As soon as I hand you over to Walker I'm just another pilot."

"Aren't you going to yell at me about that, even a little?" Chuck asked.

Casey shrugged. "It wasn't your decision. I just hope you appreciate what Walker is doing for you."

Chuck shook his head as they walked towards their gate. "I don't understand how she could do this," Chuck replied. "I mean I'm glad to not be in a bunker, but how could she do this? Her career, her whole life, I mean I know it's ten years, but still."

Casey grimaced. "It's not ten years, not for her anyway. You have to stay in the NSA's reach for ten years. That's the deal you made with Beckman. Sarah's assignment from the CIA is permanent. In their eyes she's married to you. They essentially told her not to come back."

"What?" Chuck muttered in shock.

"Permanent assignments don't just happen. It's usually a punishment. As long as Sarah works for the CIA, her job is going to be guarding you. If she leaves she'll be off assignment," Casey shrugged. "Rogue."

"So what, she has to follow me around for the rest of my life?" Chuck stopped walking in the middle of the passageway. Upset people muttered epitaphs at him as they walked around.

"Exactly, so don't be...well…don't be you. Have some consideration for what she's given up. Now come on," Casey started walking again. They sat in silence for a few minutes at the gate. Instead of first class they were flying coach, which was quite an experience sitting in close quarters with the hulking man. It limited the topics of conversation. Not that Casey really appeared to want to talk to him.

They made the four and a half hour journey mostly in silence. In fact it wasn't until they'd already deplaned and were walking towards baggage claim that Chuck got up the courage to say what he needed to say. "Casey?" he called after his friend. Casey appeared to be trying to make a rapid escape.

"What?" Casey asked spinning around.

"I wanted to say…thank you, for everything. You were a really great…I don't know, protector, I guess. I appreciate everything you've done for me."

"Are you done?" Casey demanded.

"I guess," Chuck said sadly.

"Good, because it's not my job to protect you anymore and if you ever talk to me with that hitch in your voice again, I'm gunna smack you from here to Calcutta, do you understand me?"

"Yes." Chuck nodded. "I'll miss working with you too."

Casey huffed and spun around doubling his pace. Chuck jogged after him. "You're gunna miss me," Chuck told him. Casey let out a long breath and Chuck was just about to try needling him again when he saw her. She was standing at the security exit. Dressed in jeans and a t-shirt, she'd have been inconspicuous, if she wasn't so pretty. She grinned and waved when he noticed her. Chuck waved weakly back.

"There she is," Casey grunted.

"You aren't coming?" Chuck asked.

"I've got another flight to catch. I'm sure you can make it the 20 feet past the security barrier."

"You aren't even going to say goodbye to Sarah?" Chuck asked.

"I told her goodbye when I couldn't talk her out of this stupid plan. She's your problem now." Casey shook his head and started backing away. "Good luck, Bartowksi, try and stay alive, if you don't mind."

Casey spun and started walking away. Chuck turned back towards Sarah she was still grinning as she waited. She gestured him forward and Chuck closed the few steps between them. "Hi," she said. Then she surprised him by reaching forward and giving him a hug. She kissed him on the cheek. "Shall we go get your bags?"

Chuck was shocked. "Uh, Casey sends his regards."

Sarah rolled her eyes. "I take it, he's still a little mad at me?"

"I don't think he's ever been a _little_ mad at anything. Honestly, he's been even more unreadable that normal, ever since we got to Washington last time. I can't tell if he likes me or hates me."

"He likes you, a lot actually," Sarah assured him. "Let's go get your stuff, I can't wait for you to see our new house!"

She grabbed his hand and tugged him towards the escalators that went to baggage claim. He'd never seen her quite like this, she was excited in a way Chuck didn't think he'd ever experienced. When they got to the car, Sarah stopped him. "Give me your wallet."

"What?"

"Give me your wallet, your phone and your passport."

"I don't have a passport and why are you mugging me?" Sarah tossed a new wallet at him. It looked exactly like his old one. She took a deep breath. "When we leave the airport you won't be Chuck Bartowski anymore. I need all of your IDs. We'll sanitize your luggage your personal effects when we get home, but you need your new ID and stuff now, just in case. Chuck handed over his wallet and pulled out a new one. It had money…credit cards a new drivers license from the state of Maryland. "How did you do this?"

Sarah shook her head a laughed. "Who is it you think you're living with?" She collected his wallet and phone and stuffed them into an envelope then stuffed the envelope into a black bag and then slipped the black bag into a hidden compartment in the floor of her car.

"That's cool, you have a secret compartment?"

Again Sarah just laughed. "Wait until you see my gun safe."

"We need a whole gun safe?" Chuck asked.

"You're living with me. I come with guns."

"What else do you come with?"

"A pet Shetland pony named Marmalade."

"You're kidding…"

"Yes." Sarah nodded. "Now buckle your seat belt. I'm can't protect you from being flung through the windshield."

"Marmalade? That's very specific," Chuck commented as Sarah zoomed around and around the airport parking's ramp at speeds that could barely be considered safe on the freeway. She pulled up behind another car and honked at it. If it noticed her, there wasn't any indication from the other driver.

"When I was a little girl, I always wanted a pet. Dad never allowed it, of course. But I asked all the time. So finally I made up an imaginary one when I was seven. It was a pony named Marmalade."

"That's sweet…and kind of crazy."

Sarah glared at him as she paid for their parking and they left the airport. "And you wonder why I don't share with you."

Chuck nodded. "Sorry, you're right. I had an imaginary friend when I was a kid too."

"I know," Sarah nodded. "Craig, he was an astrophysicist."

"Ellie told you that?" Chuck sputtered. Sarah smiled widely and pulled onto the freeway.

"Yep, I know all your secrets."

"That hardly seems fair, I know almost none of yours."

"What do you want to know?" Sarah asked.

Chuck turned so he could face her. "You mean you'll tell me?"

"Anything you want."

"What changed?" Chuck asked.

"I'm not your handler anymore," Sarah shrugged. "I'm not really an agent anymore. I mean don't get me wrong you can't ever tell anyone anything that's real about me. You can't even tell them anything about Sarah Walker, but if _you_ want to know, I'll tell you."

"You mean it?"

"Try me," Sarah suggested.

"What is your real name, like your first real name?"

"I don't know."

"What?" Chuck asked. "How could you not know?"

"My first memory of my name is Melissa Cunningham, but I know that's not my name. Director Graham found a birth certificate with my name on it that said Denise Hoffman, but it's a fake. My dad had changed his name at least a dozen times before he had me. I have no idea what he called me at the hospital and I whenever I've asked him about it, he said a "real" ID was something I was better off without the burden of. Names just never really meant that much to me." Sarah shrugged. "Oh, I forgot, Sarah Watson, it's nice to meet you, although it's Sarah Carmichael when we're at home." Sarah brandished her hand to Chuck where a simple wedding band was visible. "It's nice to meet you Mr. Carmichael." Sarah put her left hand back on the wheel and offered him her right.

"Call me, Chuck," he said as he shook her hand. "Do I need to wear one of those too?"

"Baby steps, I have years of experience switching between married and single. It's no big deal if you aren't wearing a ring, but at home we're married and at the office we don't know each other…yet."

"Well that's not confusing at all." Sarah just shrugged and after a few moments Chuck went back to his previous line of questioning. "So you really don't know your original name?" Sarah shook her head. "Does that bother you?"

"It's just kind of weird… don't you want to know?"

"Not really."

"What if you have a family?"

"What if I do? I don't know them."

"Don't you care about anybody in your past?" Chuck asked.

"Sure," Sarah reached out and squeezed Chuck's hand. In less than half an hour from the Airport, Sarah had exited the freeway and was driving down a nice neighborhood full gated drive ways. She pulled up to one driveway and punched in a security a security code. There were no houses visible, just a large hill filled with trees. They drove for a bit until they got to the other side of the hill where they came to a barricade.

Sarah pulled up to the guard house and a man stepped out and bent down to the window. "Hello, Mrs. Carmichael, is this the famous Mr. Carmichael?"

Sarah grinned and raised her eyebrows. "Indeed."

"Can I see some, I.D. Mr. Carmichael?" the guard asked.

"Oh…uh, sure." Chuck removed the driver's license his new wallet and handed it over to the man. He looked at it for a moment.

"Already got your new address and everything, wow, you're efficient." He handed the license back. "The first few times you get a new guard you'll have to show your ID, but don't worry, once we know who you are, we'll let you right through."

"It's no problem," Sarah assured him.

"Have a nice day, Ma'am, Sir." The guard returned to his shack and pressed a button that moved the gate out of the way.

"There's an armed guard controlling who gets in and out? How is this not a prison again?"

Sarah sighed. "This was a compromise, Chuck, not perfection. If the perimeter is secured then you don't have to have me with you every single second of the day. I'm trying to make this as normal as possible, but it's not one hundred percent normal. The guards aren't going to bug you, as long as you identify yourself they'll let you in and out. But they'll let us know if the perimeter is breached, which means I don't have secure it all the time." Sarah shrugged. "With a one person detail, this was the best I could do."

They had driven by several large houses. Some of them looked like small mansions, others just looked like mansions. Sarah pulled her Porsche into the driveway of one of the smaller houses Chuck had seen in the compound. It was still pretty large with a brick face and very basic with an ill kept yard. It didn't really seem to belong with the other carefully groomed houses in compound. It was simpler. "Welcome home," Sarah said.

"This is our house?" Chuck asked.

Sarah nodded. "Yep. Wait until you see the inside."

"Wow, homey," Chuck whistled when he walked through the door.

There was almost no furniture and just a few boxes obscured the charm of the house. It had polished hardwood floors and little arches between the room. The lights were mostly sconces. It was an elegant, if slightly dated look. Chuck peeked into the kitchen to find it filled with appliances that were still in their boxes and cherry wood cabinets. The counters were a charcoal granite, with stainless steel major appliances. "Nice," Chuck commented.

"It's really a beautiful house," Sarah tugged Chuck out of the kitchen into the living room and down the hall to the bedroom and a guest room. The master bedroom was mostly decorated, but the furniture didn't look new, but it also didn't look like it had really been used. The guest room was completely empty save a pile of boxes.

"So where's the rest of the furniture?"

"We haven't picked it out yet."

"We?"

"Yeah, this is _our_ house, not my house. I didn't want to pick paint colors or buy furniture until you got here."

Chuck frowned. "We have to decorate it all ourselves?"

Sarah laughed. "No, we _get_ to decorate it all ourselves. This is the first place I've lived that wasn't completely disposable since…" she trailed off.

"Since when?" Chuck asked.

"Ever, really, I've never been a stuff girl. Dad and I never took anything we couldn't pack easily in the car and when you're a spy, it's hard to accumulate anything. Even if you have a home, you never go there. I mean I cleaned out my apartment last week, and yielded everything in the bedroom and a coffee maker. I had some clothes and jewelry, but honestly. Other than my car I own practically nothing."

"That's kinda sad."

Sarah shrugged and smiled. "It's easier for me. I want to build a life here. I don't feel like I've left that much behind. You, had a family and friends which makes it harder. I can't replace that, but hopefully I can help take the edge off. You know, something familiar in a strange land."

"But you did have a life. You were an agent, the best and you're walking away from that to play babysitter for me."

Sarah's smile turned into a frown. "I'm not your babysitter. Okay fine, I'm your bodyguard and yes there are rules. But, Chuck, I'm trying to make this a good experience…"

Chuck shook his head. "How can this be a good experience? You're giving up your career for this?" Chuck waved his hand vaguely around the house.

"You didn't think it was such a problem when I was guarding you for the last three years," Sarah replied in a hurt tone.

"Because I was the Intersect!" Chuck explained emphatically.

"So what?" Sarah replied. "Do you need protection any less now that there's another Intersect? They'll still torture you for information if you're captured by enemy forces."

Chuck ran his hands through his hair. "Sarah, I'm not going to lie, there was always some part of me that hopped to have a life with you after the Intersect mission ended. I really hoped that you'd find your way back to me, but I wanted you to do it because you wanted to be here, not because of some obligation you felt to me, not because you felt guilty."

"Chuck, I'm not here out of obligation…"

"Can you honestly say to me that you'd be here, if the alternative wasn't that I'd be in a bunker?" Chuck looked directly into her eyes. Her mouth opened as she gazed back to him, but then it shut and she looked away.

"What difference does it make?" Sarah asked. "If we're together, does it matter why?"

"Of course it matters why!" Chuck roared. Sarah shuttered at Chuck's tone and didn't turn to face him again. Chuck took a deep breath. "When I was nine, I found an injured blue jay. It had a broken wing and couldn't fly, it was hungry and probably sick. I took it home and called a vet. I couldn't afford to pay to help it, but he told me how to build a splint for the wing and said that it was his best chance and that I'd have to feed it. It took me some time, but I built the splint and made it a nest and I gathered worms and bugs to feed it. When it got better I built a cage for it and kept it in my room. For six months I kept him in the cage. One day my mother came to me and told me, that I had to set Link free…"

"You named your bird Link?" Sarah laughed with a sniffle. It wasn't until that point that Chuck realized she was even sniffling.

"Yeah, I did, I was very into the Legend of Zelda at the time, anyway, she told me that I had to set Link free. I told her that Link was mine and I wanted to keep him. She said that birds are meant to be free, and that if I let Link go and he came back to me, then he was my bird, but if I let him go and he chose to be free then he belonged to something greater than myself.

"Well I was selfish and I kept Link in the cage. He seemed happy enough at first and I liked having him in my room, but when spring came, he would watch the birds outside and you could just tell he wanted to be out there. Eventually, I took the cage outside and let him go. It wasn't fair of me to withhold Link's freedom because I was selfish. He flew away, but once in a while when I was out in the backyard he'd come and sit next to me and chirp. That was a million times better than having him in my room in a cage because he chose to be there. It meant so much more… and now through my own selfishness, I've caged another bird."

Chuck turned and walked away he stepped outside and sat down on the front porch, watching as the sky started to turn colors from the twilight. He was mad at himself for being snippy with Sarah, but still irritated enough at her to keep him from going back inside. How could she sacrifice so much for him? If what Casey said was true… Chuck wanted the shadows over take the compound wondering how they could make this work. Every time he thought about having Sarah as a girlfriend, mate, wife, companion, whatever all he could think about was her lack of choice. How could they be a real couple if she didn't have any other choices?

_A/N: I realize that this isn't the most optimal of stopping points. The chapter was getting very long and Chuck and Sarah are about to have a very long and serious talk. So that got moved to the next chapter._

_I wanted to take a second to thank all the reviewers that have made this project and my other project Chuck vs. The Doldrums so rewarding to work on. You guys are the best! I really mean that. I didn't have any intention of putting up another update this week, but you guys are so great you talked me into it. Thanks so much!_


	9. Chapter 9 A New Hope

_**Disclaimer**__: Will the real owners of Chuck please stand up? Not so fast everyone who's reading this, including me! NBC and Time Warner own Chuck. You'll own nothing and like it! Don't worry though, that just means you're like me. _

_A/N: I was truly staggered and exceedingly pleased by the response to the last chapter. I really can't tell you how happy it makes me to hear from all of you. Consider this chapter a reward. This was supposed to come out on Wednesday, but I was too inspired. Eventually all this inspiration is going to catch up with you!_

Chapter 9: A New Hope

Chuck was still sitting on the porch after his fight with Sarah. He never heard Sarah approach him from behind. "I'm not a bird," she said coldly.

Chuck turned to look at her, she did not look particularly good. Her unhappiness was painted on her face. "It was an analogy."

"I know!" Sarah said indignantly. "I'm not some pet. I chose to do this because I care about what happens to you. That's your fault. You didn't have to make me care about you. I've never cared this much about anyone in my whole life, but you're the one that did this. It's you. And you can't just turn around after three years of making yourself the most important person in my life and then tell me I'm not allowed to care about you anymore. That I'm just supposed to leave and not look back and not wonder what happened to you. I can't, I'm not that person anymore and if you don't like it, then you have nobody to blame but yourself!" She whirled around and slammed the door as she disappeared back inside the house.

Chuck watched the door as heard Sarah banging around inside the house. They were angry sounds and he guessed she must be working in the kitchen. It was the only part of the house that had anything in it besides the bedroom. The bedroom, Chuck's mind clicked with the fact that while yes there was a furnished bedroom, there was only one queen sized bed in the house so far as he'd seen. He wasn't sure where his bed was, he'd seen some of his boxes in the house, his furniture must have arrived, but he hadn't seen it. Did Sarah actually expect them to share a bed?

Chuck's curiosity and confusion eventually led him to go back inside. He found Sarah in the most unlikely of predicaments. She was cooking. It reminded him eerily of their trip into the Suburbs years ago. "You're cooking?"

"I thought you might want to eat tonight. There's no pizza delivery here," she stated frostily.

"Sarah, I don't expect you to cook and clean for me…"

"Well what do you expect? That I should sit around with my feet up when you're hungry? How about when I'm hungry? I'm trying to build a life here. That means cooking and cleaning and yard work and decorating the house and paying bills and taking my car to get the oil changed. That's life, this is life and even if we're fighting, we still have to eat." Sarah retorted angrily.

"Can I help?" Chuck asked.

"Sure, do you know how to cook?" Sarah asked.

"A few things. What are we having?"

"Spaghetti."

"I think even the two of us will be able to manage spaghetti. Do we have spaghetti sauce?"

"No, but we have tomato sauce, tomato paste, spices and a recipe book. If you want to help you can brown the sausage."

"Sure, I can burn the sausage."

"Ha ha… The frying pans are down there, the sausage is in the fridge."

Chuck worked at Sarah's side as they made dinner. It wasn't fancy. Spaghetti, with sausage with green beans on the side, it wasn't gourmet, but it was the first meal of their lives together. Sarah looked subdued as she spun her last few noodles around her fork. Chuck decided to try and make peace. "I'm sorry I called you a bird before. You don't have bird legs, I should have realized my mistake."

Sarah's frown didn't break. "I just really thought, some part of you, might enjoy living with me."

"Sarah, I've dreamed about what this would be like, but in all those dreams you never gave up everything for me. Sometimes you chose a different life, some sacrifice…but you never threw everything away for me. Why'd you do it?"

She didn't answer right away. Her fork kept twirling across her plate. "I don't know." Sarah paused for more than a minute before she started talking again. "When I found out Beckman wanted to kill you, I freaked. Casey calmed me down and we started working on a plan. Getting you a job with the NSA…I mean, once you're part of the company, they'll protect you… But, General Beckman didn't go for it…When she decided to issue the termination order, Casey told her she could stuff it and that since his job was to protect you that he'd kill anybody else she tried to assign the job to." Sarah wasn't making eye contact, she just kept watching her fork. "Last week, after you took the test, Beckman still wasn't going for it. Your scored well enough…more than enough, but she said it was too expensive, that they couldn't watch you all the time. That you'd do something stupid and she'd eventually have to have you terminated anyway. That it was better for you in the bunker. And I knew…I knew that I'd never know that you were safe unless I was the one keeping you safe, because the minute I turned my back, Beckman would try something and I wouldn't be there to stop it."

"You could have just let me go to the bunker…" Chuck pointed out.

"No… Chuck, I couldn't. For someone like me…finding someone you really care about, finding anyone that cares more about you than they care about themselves... I couldn't just walk away and wonder."

"So this, all of this is because you didn't want to worry about me?"

Sarah shook her head. "No, not by a long shot. On our date…when you kissed me in the car, when you held my hand at dinner, when you held me, when I made you kiss me in your hotel room, that was all real, for me anyway. Maybe we can have that?"

"A date?" Chuck asked.

"No…a life, you didn't want a one night stand. So here we are, ten years, guaranteed."

Sarah finally looked up at him her gaze was probing and Chuck evaded her eyes.

"Sarah, I don't know…can you really build a relationship off mutual guilt?"

"Why do you feel guilty?" Sarah asked.

"How can I not? John Casey _was_ Agent Casey. Everything about him was Agent Casey, there wasn't one part of his personality that wasn't born to be NSA Agent John Casey…well except the bonsai trees… And you, you're so much more, but you loved being a spy. You love traveling the world. You love knife fights in Jakarta. You're here and you're trying to be happy but the sparkle in your eye you had the day I met you, it's gone."

"The sparkle was just CIA issued eye drops Chuck…"

"No it wasn't, you used to love seducing marks. Admit it you had fun manipulating me when we first met…"

"No," Sarah shook her head. "I never enjoyed manipulating you, not once I knew you…Once I pointed my gun at you and you didn't freak out. You'd known me like thirty six hours and you trusted me even though I'd done nothing but lie to you, after that, it was never fun."

"So what, you don't want to be a spy anymore?"

Sarah surprised him by standing up. She moved over to him and pushed the card table they were using for dinner back so she could sit on his lap and she wrapped her arms around him. "I want a life, here, with you. We'll figure out the rest."

Chuck slid his arms around Sarah and held her. It was excruciating, the added weight was making folding chair he was sitting in cut into his legs, but he held her anyway.

"We should get some work done, we have to go buy furniture tomorrow."

"What should we do?"

"Let's clean up dinner and then I'll show you the downstairs."

After they put the dishes away, Sarah showed Chuck the door that led down to the finished basement. It was kind of dark down there, but all of Chuck's furniture was piled around the basement. "We can get some lamps and stuff. I just figured, you know, it'd be a good spot for you to spread out and do your thing. I'd like to put a small gym down here, other than that it's all yours."

"Thanks," Chuck said awkwardly. "I'm sleeping down here?" Chuck's bed was included along with his desk and his chair and his old couch.

"That's up to you," Sarah shrugged. "You can set your bed up down here, or in one of the guest rooms or…" Sarah trailed off. "Until we get things setup, why don't you just sleep upstairs with me?"

Chuck gave her a quizzical look. "You sure about that?"

"It's no big deal right? We've slept in the same bed a lot of times. It's not going to hurt us."

"So this is a convenience thing?"

"What is it with you and labels?" Sarah huffed.

Chuck blushed. "I just don't want to get the wrong impression."

"Let's just call it an experiment and if you're still sleeping there in a week, then we'll reevaluate the sleeping arrangements. Unfortunately, it needs to look like we share a room. So even if you don't sleep there…you still have to move in."

"For cover?" Chuck asked.

"Just in case we have nosy neighbors, you're not the only one around here being guarded, someone might decide to take a peek in the windows or something. We need to be able sell that we're a couple at least from the outside and who knows maybe you'll like sleeping with me?"

Chuck rolled his eyes at Sarah. "But we're still just sleeping right?"

"Oh, I'm making no such claims of self control. Last time I had you that close to a bed it was your propriety that stopped us. I've had to be the one with self control for years, I think it's your turn."

"So you're saying you're ready to go upstairs and go at it right now?" Chuck asked cheekily.

"Who needs to go upstairs?" Sarah challenged. "Just clear some of the boxes off of that desk..."

"Sounds _magical_…"

"Chuck, do you have any idea how long it's been since I've had sex?"

"Shouldn't we at least pretend to go on a few dates first?" Chuck countered.

Sarah shrugged. "Whatever."

"We're definitely going to need some rules."

Sarah had opened one of Chuck's boxes and started putting books into a book shelf. "Oh great, more rules, why are there always rules?"

"Sarah," Chuck said seriously. "We have to live together for at least ten years. I don't want to rush into something and have it be awkward for ten years. You know how much I care about you. When we get that far…I want it to be because …I want to know, it's not a cover. I know you care about me. I do, but it's been so hard to know what was real and what was cover and I do feel guilty because of what you gave up for me. Let's just…be careful."

Sarah stopped putting the books into his bookshelves and came and stood right in front of him. She ran her fingers through his hair and her eyes locked on to his. Sarah looked down for a second and then back up, like she was searching for something in his eyes. She leaned closer and Chuck was mesmerized by her gaze. Sarah shifted to the side so that her cheek rubbed against his and he felt her breath in his ear. "You're so smart," she whispered. Then she took his earlobe in her teeth and bit it gently. She elicited a noise that Chuck could only describe as a purr. Suddenly she spun around and ran up the stairs. "Come up when you get bored unpacking!" she yelled from the top of the stairs.

"Oh, God," Chuck muttered. "She's going to be trouble."

***

Chuck awoke to find Sarah snuggled into him. They hadn't gone to sleep this way. When he'd fallen asleep with the covers tucked securely under his chin, Sarah had been her normal respectful distance from him. Now her forehead was nestled against his chin, her arm was around him and she had a leg draped over him. Chuck's mutinous body was very meticulously recording the feeling of each point of contact as Sarah's breath caused alternating patters of hot and cold on a section of his chest. Chuck was frozen for his part, completely unsure what to do. His arm was trapped underneath her and there was no way he could move without waking her. It was still dark out, but there was quite literally no way he was going to be able to fall back asleep this morning. Instead he decided to lie there quietly and think about the events of the last few days.

On one hand, this was what Chuck had always dreamed of. Sarah was here with him and she said that she wanted a relationship with him. On the other, she didn't really have a choice. She was going to be stuck with him for ten years. What if it didn't work out? What if the stress of being forced to be together was more than their relationship could handle? Chuck couldn't deny that he wanted this. Sarah's head resting on his chest felt like victory, but at what cost? The thoughts kept spinning around and around inside his head and after a couple hours of this self inflicted torment he'd worked himself into quite a mood. He thought Sarah was still asleep, until he felt a gentle kiss on his jugular that made him shiver.

"You're thinking too much," Sarah mumbled.

"What?" Chuck asked.

"You're thinking too much, knock it off, it's keeping me awake."

"You can hear me thinking now?"

Sarah shushed him and attempted to snuggle closer to him, considering that she was mostly laying on top of him this proved a challenge. It did however allow her to get her body between Chuck's arm and his torso freeing his arm. Chuck curled it around her and used his newly freed arm to rub her side gently. This elicited an approving noise from Sarah so he continued stroking. His hand sliding down until he reached the hem of her shirt, when it slid back the other direction it slipped slightly under Sarah's top. Chuck froze.

For a moment nothing happened, but then a very irritated sounding Sarah grumbled. "Well don't stop!"

"Sorry," Chuck said. "I didn't realize what I was doing, my hand just sort of ended up inside your shirt."

Sarah's head left his chest and suddenly her beautiful blue eyes were squinting at him in the early dawn light. "See, now you're thinking too much again, what did I tell you about that?"

"Sorry, I just…"

"Chuck, you can tell me whatever you want, but if your hand doesn't start moving again in the next five seconds, I'm going to be tired, aroused and _irritated."_

Chuck frowned at her. "You're aroused, just from _that_?"

"Chuck," Sarah said in a very irritated voice. "I haven't had sex in three years, eight months aaaaaannnnd twenty one days now. When you're in the same area code, I'm aroused. When you're lying in my bed cuddling me, with your hand under my shirt, I'm halfway home."

"Wait you know the exact numbers of days?"

Sarah huffed. "When I really need to think about something else, or risk attacking you, I do the math in my head."

"Wow," Chuck shook his head. "You're cute when you're nerdy." Sarah rolled her eyes. "You know there are other ways to help relieve the… er…tension."

"Yes, I know," Sarah nodded and then she looked down at him with a very serious expression. "But after three years, eight months and twenty one days, even those start wear pretty thin. I mean there are some I haven't tried of course…smoking…compulsive eating…golf, but unless you really want me to take one of those up, you're gunna have to help me out…hopefully soon." Sarah rolled over to her own side of the bed. "You know I almost killed you when you shot me down in your hotel room."

"I didn't realize you thought about sex this much."

"I don't!" Sarah objected. "Well I didn't used to. I mean, I never even really liked sex that much until… well that's not important, but you spend years going out on cover dates with a guy you really like and cuddling and kissing in front of his family and suddenly every time he brushes against you, you can't stop thinking about it and it gets worse and worse and …" Sarah trailed off. "Are we having sex this morning?"

"I don't think so…"

"Then I'm going to go take a shower."

Sarah hopped out of bed and Chuck felt his eyes burning as he watched her walk away in her boy short panties.

"I _really_ have to get my own bed setup today," he muttered.


	10. Chapter 10 Trauma

_**Disclaimer:**_ _This is the part where you figure out that I don't own Chuck. You already knew that? Good, then we'll skip that part._

Chapter 10: Trauma

Sarah and Chuck started their furniture shopping at ByKEA. It was huge. Chuck was somewhat overwhelmed by just how much stuff there was. Sarah wasn't really finding anything she liked. "I don't like any of this stuff."

"We could go to a different store."

"But everyone loves ByKEA! I should be able to find something I like."

"Everyone loves Largemart, that doesn't mean I shop for my clothes there."

Sarah eyed Chuck's outfit critically for a moment. "You know, it couldn't hurt."

"Hey!"

Sarah smirked. She reached over and took Chuck's hand. "I think I've had enough of the Swedish, lets go upstairs and get some lunch and then we can get out of here."

"You want to eat here?"

Sarah shrugged. "The Salmon Caesar salad looked good…do you want to go somewhere else? I'm sure there's a Weinerlicious or an Orange Orange around here somewhere."

"You know someday I'm going to take you on a successful date that costs more than ten dollars."

"Really?" Sarah grinned. "But who would you have do your scout work for you?"

"I didn't say it'd be good, just a successful date."

"What constitutes a successful date?" Sarah asked as she led Chuck to the cafeteria.

"Well let's see." Chuck ticked off on his fingers. "Um absolutely nobody can try and kill us."

"I don't know, I've had some pretty good dates that included people trying to kill me," Sarah replied.

"Second, nobody cries."

"Hey, I only cried that one time!" Sarah objected as they waited inline with their trays.

"And, there has to actually be a promise of another date afterwards."

Sarah gave him a lopsided grin. "It really seems like we should have been able to figure that out by now. The criteria certainly aren't that hard. Maybe we could spice it up an bit and put in a requirement for reaching third base?"

"If it were that easy, you would have thought it would have happened before now."

"Well we don't have the security of the whole nation hanging over us now."

Chuck and Sarah were just sitting down at a table and the people across from them gave them a very strange look.

"I hope you still think I'm cool."

"Oh come on, you were never cool," Sarah teased.

"Hey! That's not nice." Sarah covered her mouth with her hand as she started giggling.

"You said you weren't funny," Chuck said petulantly. "Then three years later you start cracking jokes."

"Maybe I'm learning," Sarah shrugged. "It's weird, ever since I picked you up at the airport I feel like the weight of the world is suddenly off my shoulders. I'm practically giddy."

"Really?" Chuck asked.

"Yes, really, can't you tell?" Chuck turned his gaze and looked out into the giant sea of cars in the parking lot. It was so big he couldn't even make out Sarah's Porsche from here. "Hey, where'd you go?" Sarah questioned.

Chuck brought his attention back to Sarah. "It's nothing."

"What is?"

"Nothing, I swear." Sarah gave him a reproachful look, but she didn't push it further.

"Where do you want to go next?" Chuck asked.

"I was thinking we might stop by that Blowe's down the street. We need a washer and dryer and some yard implements, oh, and maybe some patio furniture!"

***

Later that evening found Chuck and Sarah strolling through a Bullseye Department Store. They picked up a lamp and some decorative accessories. Chuck couldn't believe all of the stuff they'd bought. There wasn't exactly a lot of room left in Sarah's Porsche, all things considered it was not the perfect car to take with you on a home decorating run.

Chuck stopped in the bedding section and looked over some sheets. "You don't like my sheets?" Sarah asked.

"No, they were fine," Chuck waved Sarah off. "I was thinking of getting some new ones for my bed. I've had the sheets I brought with me since college, they're kinda thread bare."

"Oh," Sarah said flatly. She stood and watched him while he looked them over. When he picked up a striped blue set, she said. "I'm sorry about this morning. I can tone it down a little if it bothers you. I didn't mean to make you uncomfortable…"

"It's not you." Chuck shook his head.

"Well then what?"

"I just think it would be best if I had my own place to sleep while we work things out."

"While we work what out?" Sarah replied indignantly.

"Us," Chuck said waving his arms helplessly.

"What is there to work out?"

Chuck hesitated and in the moment of hesitation Sarah spun and around and walked away from him. "Sarah, wait." But she didn't wait, Chuck pushed their cart full of items after her. She was a trained spy however and she lost him in less than a minute. Aggravated, Chuck wandered around the store looking for her, but didn't find her. He'd been circling around the store for almost thirty minutes when his phone rang.

""Where are you?" Chuck asked.

"In the car, waiting for you, stop going around in circles and hurry up, I want to go back to the house."

"Are you okay?"

"I'm fine, just hurry up." The phone connection dropped as Sarah hung up on him.

Chuck sighed and pushed the cart towards the registers. "Nice one, Bartowski," he muttered.

Chuck's attempts to get Sarah to talk on the way home were met with short responses that she was 'fine' and that nothing was wrong. But Sarah felt a million miles away as she drove the fifteen or so miles back to the compound. When they arrived back at the house, Sarah threw her keys on the counter and immediately walked to the back of the house. Chuck sighed and carried in the rest of the purchases they'd bought from the car.

When the car was finished being unloaded, he grabbed one of the Bullseye bags and headed downstairs to try and get his bed setup. The bed frame was all the way at the back of the pile of stuff. He'd been working for a good twenty minutes when he heard Sarah say from behind him. "You should come upstairs."

Chuck jumped a bit at her voice, he was really going to have to get used to living with someone who could move silently.

"Hey," Chuck said as he looked over at Sarah. There were no signs that she had been bothered by their earlier incident other than the ultra conservative pajamas she was wearing from neck to ankle. "I was just…"

"I know what you were doing," Sarah interrupted. "It's really late and we've been out shopping all day. You should just come upstairs and come to bed. I promise I won't touch you."

"Sarah," Chuck said pleadingly. "Please don't be like that. I want what you're offering. I am _not_ turning you down. I just need a little time to adjust. I spent three years adjusting to the fact that you and I were never going to happen. I made my peace with it and now suddenly you're here and you're interested. Morgan and Ellie are gone. The Intersect doesn't matter anymore. I start a job on Monday that I don't even know how to do. I live in Maryland and I don't know where anything is. And I feel this incredible guilt that I somehow screwed over two of my best friends and cost them their jobs." Chuck ran his hands through his hair. "You're so incredible, really, you are the only thing that keeps me sane and have been for years now, but I'm hanging on by a hair's breadth here. I really want to know before we jump into something that it's because we love each other and we want to spend our lives together." Chuck glanced away from her briefly before he reestablished eye contact. "Because if it ends up not being what you want, ten years is a long time to have to spend with someone you failed at a relationship with."

"Okay," Sarah nodded stiffly. "Will you come upstairs for tonight, _please_?"

"Sure," Chuck agreed. "Do you understand what I'm saying?"

"I understand, Chuck, I'm still not an idiot. You don't feel about me the way that I thought you did." Chuck cringed.

"Sarah, that's _soooo _not it. I just need _some _control over my life." Chuck took a few steps over to where Sarah was standing rigidly and brushed her bangs back behind her ear. He leaned down and kissed her on the cheek.

"I'm asking you, not telling you, not to spend all night organizing the basement just so you don't have to sleep with me. It hurts that you'd want to avoid me so much that you'd do this tonight."

Chuck pulled Sarah into a long hug. "Let's go then."

Sarah turned and pulled Chuck by the hand up the stairs. As they walked to the bedroom Sarah said. "It's not like I have anyone else either, you know. You're all I have left too."

When they settled in bed Sarah must have been on the absolute edge, because she seemed a mile away. In the darkness it would have been difficult to tell that anything was wrong, but it was the breathing that gave her away. A full forty five minutes after they went to bed Sarah was still breathing unevenly. Chuck had spent enough time listening to Sarah sleeping, to know exactly what it sounded like. She was still upset, he didn't know how he could tell, he could just tell. "It's not you," Chuck said finally.

"What?" Sarah said.

"My problems with my situation…my struggle with all of _this, _it's not you."

"I know I…" Sarah started.

"No, you're lying over there blaming yourself because it's not working out the way you thought and you shouldn't. It's not your fault."

"I wasn't!" Sarah protested. "I just can't sleep."

"Come're," Chuck insisted reaching out for Sarah's middle and trying to pull her towards him. He hadn't really considered how strong Sarah was and misjudged the effort required to pull her closer. She was passively resisting him, but she was proving herself to be difficult to move. "Sarah, please." Sarah suddenly slid across the sheets and into Chuck's arms with relative ease. Chuck pressed Sarah's back to his chest and wrapped his arm around her middle. Then tucked an arm under her head and wrapped it around the front of her shoulders so that he had her in a full body hug. Chuck could feel the tension in Sarah's muscles and he knew he had to hurry before she squirmed free. "You are the most important person in my life. You have been for a long time. I haven't forgotten that and I don't want to forget. I'm not good at change. Maybe you never noticed because you made it so much easier when the Intersect happened. I cling to things, I have trouble letting go. I might never have adjusted to getting kicked out of Stanford, if it wasn't for you. I definitely wouldn't have been able to deal with the Intersect without you and I can't do this without you either, please just be a little patient with me." Chuck felt Sarah's body relax bit by bit. She didn't respond verbally, but with each moment she didn't try to escape his grasp, Chuck celebrated a small victory. When he finally heard her breathing even out he tucked her head under his chin on the pillow and fell asleep.

***

Chuck awoke to Sarah thrashing and flinging him out of bed. He landed hard on the floor hitting his head. Sarah was screaming at the top of her lungs. "Okay, owe…" Chuck muttered. "What's wrong?"

At the sound of Chuck's voice, Sarah's scream cut off. "Chuck?"

"Who were you expecting?" He heard Sarah take a large breath and let it out slowly. He could only see her silhouette sitting on the bed, but he saw her shoulders sag.

"Chuck, I'm so sorry… Are you okay?"

"I think you may have damaged the Intersect, but I don't really need it anymore, I'm fine."

Sarah scrambled out of the bed and knelt beside him. She reached up and clicked on the bedside lamp, but shielded Chuck's eyes from the light. "Where did you hit your head?" She asked in her official Intersect damage assessment voice. Chuck sat up and pointed to the back of his head. Sarah ran her fingers through his hair tenderly until she found a spot that hurt.

"Ouch."

"You're getting a bump," Sarah announced dejectedly. She turned him around. How many fingers am I holding up she asked.

"Er…I know this one…" Chuck pretended to contemplate. "Eighty Seven?"

Sarah smiled and shook her head. "Your brain is apparently still broken."

"Well as long as we have status quo."

Sarah scooched forward and until she had one leg interlaced between Chuck's and the other wrapped around his back. She leaned forward and kissed him tenderly. At the odd angle Chuck could only get one arm around Sarah, but he reached out for her anyway as the kiss extended into a gentle, loving, almost healing moment. When Sarah eventually pulled back from kissing Chuck, she put her head on his shoulder. "I am_ so_ sorry."

"You want to tell me what that was about?" Chuck asked.

"I will tell you if you want to know. It's classified and it's not pleasant."

"Do you want to tell me?" Chuck asked.

Sarah took a deep breath. "When I was just a rookie in the CIA, I wasn't even out of college yet, I did a series of missions in what used to be Yugoslavia. Our mission was ambiguous, it wasn't even entirely clear what side we were on. Sometimes we were working to destabilize the government, sometimes we were working to root out insurgents. I don't know whose agenda we were following and at the time I didn't really care. I was just happy to be selected, to be important, to be doing something with the skills I spent all of my free time learning. I was young and brash and well…not very good. I thought my Serbian was better than it actually was. I thought my Croatian was passable, which it was not and I got myself caught.

"When people catch spies and actually figure out that they are spies they don't live very long. If you're lucky they force a confession out of you, use you to embarrass your home country and then imprison you for life. Your best defense against all of this is to keep your mouth shut. If they can't figure out who you spy for, they can't use you effectively. They may still kill you, but they usually want to figure out who you are first. My Russian and French were very good and I used that to keep them confused about who I worked for. There is only one means counter espionage uses to get information out of a subject, torture."

"You were tortured?" Chuck asked

"Repeatedly," Sarah nodded. "I was a woman and so they were '_nice_' to me. But they kept me tightly bound pretty much all the time, while they subjected me to whatever torture they wanted to try. I'm not great at being confined. I do okay if I'm awake and can reason it out, but if I have to sleep in handcuffs or shackles or rope, which was the favorite of the Serbs I get agitated. I'm not overly fond of being touched…again…I handle it—"

"But when you're asleep, you lash out," Chuck finished for her.

"I'm sorry, I didn't know that would happen," Sarah insisted. "I mean, I've never let anyone hold me like that and it was nice. I like being held by you. I do, I really do, but it's been an adjustment and I guess I freaked out."

Chuck ran his fingers through her hair. "You don't have anything to be sorry for. You didn't mean to throw me out of bed. And you didn't kill me, which I appreciate," Chuck joked. The joke fell flat however as it just made Sarah look more worried. "Look both of us have issues to work through, that's okay. I look forward to working through them with you. Granted yours are more traumatic than mine, but we'll help each other. You already help me so much, you have no idea. And if I'm being too aggressive with the touching or cuddling, just tell me."

"I like cuddling with you," Sarah objected. "I like it when you touch me, I don't want you to stop, you're the first person…" Sarah stopped talking abruptly obviously not wanting to finish the thought.

"I'm the first person who's what?" Chuck prodded.

Sarah eyed Chuck skeptically. "You're the first person, I've ever felt comfortable with just touching. You know, just because, when there isn't a real reason, when we're not, you know…when we held hands on cover dates…I've never done that with anyone, not just for fun." Chuck reached down and grasped Sarah's hand. But instead she pulled herself closer to him and wrapped her arms around him. "Please don't be self conscious about touching me, I may not always be comfortable right away, but I don't ever want you to feel bad or think twice about it. This morning waking up all wrapped up in you, was wonderful." Sarah looked up at him with a pouty lip. "That's why I don't want you to move downstairs."

"Ah the truth comes out," he chuckled.

"Is it such a bad thing being forced to snuggle me?" Sarah asked meekly.

"It's not bad, it just limits the functionality of the smarter parts of my brain."

Sarah smirked and reached up gently touching the sensitive spot on his head. "I think we got rid of most of that part tonight already."

Chuck laughed. "I hope not, there's a rumor going around that I have to do math on Monday."

Sarah giggled and pulled Chuck into another hug. "Let's go back to bed, we have a lot of organizing and unpacking to do tomorrow."


	11. Chapter 11 New Friends and Old Enemies

Chapter 11: New Friends and Old Enemies

Chuck was nervous, there wasn't any point in denying it. This was the most nervous he'd ever been on a first day at a new job. Of course his first day at the Buy More, he'd been cashier. It wasn't exactly like he hoped to keep that job for ten years and it wasn't difficult. Chuck wasn't even sure if he could do this job.

The fact that Sarah was several chairs away from him wasn't helping either. She was facing him, while he was facing away from her. She was pretending to read a book, or at least Chuck thought she was pretending. She was dressed in a very fashionable business suit, but had her hair pulled back into a bun and was wearing glasses. It wasn't Sarah. At least it wasn't as disturbing as the time she was pretending to be Ellie.

Her instructions had been very detailed. It was okay for him to glance at her occasionally, but they should avoid eye contact. He was supposed to stay in front of her as much as possible. They were taking the bus to work so that they could go together without having to carpool, which would look suspicious since they weren't supposed to know each other at the office yet. She spent most of the previous afternoon moaning about the fact that they'd have to buy a more reasonable car, nobody would believe a low grade NSA analyst and a newly minted cryptographer could afford a Porsche. Chuck had pointed out that nobody who witnessed their last cover believed a yogurt girl could afford a Porsche either, but that had only earned him a very nasty glare for more than a minute.

When their alarm had gone off this morning it had been impossibly early. Six AM was only an hour earlier that he was used to, but it seemed like so much more. Chuck moaned and whimpered when Sarah shoved him out of bed.

Now he was sitting on a bus riding to work in much the same attire he'd worn for the last several years. The only difference being his tie was silk not polyester and his shirt had long sleeves not short, Sarah had insisted. He was supposed to walk from the bus stop to the visitors entrance of the NSA building and report to the security desk. Sarah was following him as closely as she could, but despite her efforts she was going to be out of contact for quite some time. Her nervousness had been given away by the tightness in her smile when she adjusted his tie and collar before they left the house in the morning.

"Hi, I'm Charles Carmichael, reporting for my first day of work," Chuck said cheerily to the security guard at the desk. The guard look unimpressed. "What department?" he asked.

"Cryptography."

"Who are your reporting to?"

"Tom Hopkirk."

"Fill this out," said the guard handing Chuck a clip board. "Then sit over there until you're called."

Chuck started filling out the form until he got to the part where it asked for a social security number. Did Carmichael have the same social security number? What should he do? Chuck pulled out his cell phone and called Sarah.

"You miss me already?" Sarah answered. Chuck could actually hear the grin on her face.

"Hi, mom!" Chuck said a little too loudly. "What's my social security number?"

"Uh, you really know how to get a girl out of the mood."

"Yeah, I can't believe I forgot to bring it either, can you look it up for me?"

Sarah laughed. "There are two copies of your social security card in your wallet. I put them in there this morning. There is one for you, one for HR, when you talk to them later this morning."

"Okay, thanks, Mom. I'll talk to you later."

"Seriously, you have to stop calling me that."

"I have to go, bye."

"You wouldn't just hang up on me. I'm going to make you pay for calling me your mother."

"Mom, seriously, I have to go, first day on the job and all."

"GRRRRR" Sarah growled. "The hole is getting deeper!"

"I'll tell you all about it when I get home, bye!"

Chuck hung up his phone and took out his wallet. He fished around for a minute until he found what Sarah had told him was there and he also found a picture of Sarah. He recognized it immediately it had been taken at Ellie's wedding and was Sarah in her bridesmaid gown. Chuck stared down it, struck slightly dumb by the fact that Sarah wanted a picture of herself in Chuck's wallet. He kept staring at it until a man walked over and cleared his throat. "Mr. Carmichael?"

"Yes?" Chuck answered quickly stuffing the photo back in his wallet.

"Hi, there, it's nice to meet you. I'm Tom Hopkirk your new boss. It's good to finally meet you. They didn't tell me when exactly you were starting." Chuck shook Tom's hand. "I have to say it's a bit of an unusual situation. I've never had an employee I didn't meet before they were hired. Your test scores looked good, your math was just a little weak, but tell me did you really sleep overnight in the exam room during the Crypto exam?"

Chuck smiled sheepishly. "Yeah."

Tom slapped him on the back. "Well I'll hope you'll show that kind of dedication while you're working for me."

"Are you all done with the security form?"

"I just have a few more questions."

"All right, good, finish filling that out and we'll take you upstairs so you can get processed by HR."

***

"You understand Mr. Carmichael that you'll need to read all of these policy manuals and then return this form with your signature stating that you read and are familiar with them all?"

Chuck gulped. The stack of manuals was at least half a foot high. "I understand."

"Okay, I'll need that by the end of the week. You understand your benefits package?"

"When do I get stock options?" Chuck asked.

"Mr. Carmichael, this is a government agency, not a publicly traded company, we have no stock options."

"Yeah, I know, it was just a little joke," Chuck explained.

"Ha ha, very amusing," the HR lady said sourly. "If you have no more serious questions, Mr. Carmichael, welcome to the NSA."

Tom took Chuck up to the eighth floor where their department was located. Chuck was impressed with the view. Maryland was apparently flat because he could see forever.

"I'll show you to your cube and get you logged into Spymail. Then I'll let you get settled for a moment and then I'll take you around and introduce you to the team," Tom explained.

"Spymail?" Chuck asked.

"It's just a little joke. Don't put anything in any email here that you don't want analyzed by thirty NSA analysts. Data security is as tight here as it is anywhere in the world."

"Oh," Chuck shrugged. "No problem."

"This is where you'll be sitting."

"Okay, thanks." Chuck's cube was that last one on the end of the row. It was rather plain with high walls of taupe and two rather impressive DynoSystems X5200's sitting on a desk connected to four monitors. Chuck whistled. "Nice hardware."

Tom smiled. "We are the one government agency that doesn't seem to have too much trouble keeping up with technology. Just remember, no personal thumb drives or memory cards of any kind. If you insist on using a phone with data storage capability, the IT department will insist on installing a program that will let them know exactly what's on it all the time. Data should never be removed from the company network. We'll give you remote access to the system so that you can connect from home, but you can't download anything from there either. If you try, it will notify the IT department and you'll be reprimanded. There's only one warning for trying to remove data from the NSA network. After that you'll either be fired or arrested, depending on what you tried to download. Do you understand?"

Chuck nodded and Tom continued. "It's all laid out in the Agency data policy. It's in one of those books you have there. Now, you'll need to read all of those by Friday. They are in hardcopy so you can take them home. You can't get access to much, until you've signed off on them. You'll be shadowing Michael this week, I'll introduce you in a few minutes after you get settled."

Tom showed him how to log onto the network and then left him alone for a few minutes. He wasn't quite sure what he was supposed to do, since he didn't even know what his job was yet. His phone started vibrating in his pocket and Chuck pulled it out quickly. He'd just received a text message.

_You have a really cute butt. I'm going to enjoy this assignment._

Chuck whipped around, but there was nobody behind him. He kept looking and down in the office at the end of the hallway was a familiar blonde head. Sarah gave him a small little wave and then her eyes dropped back down to whatever she was reading.

Chuck watched her for a moment then texted her back.

_Hi_

Chuck was confused by what he got back.

_Heads up_

Chuck contemplated what that meant when a voice from above him said. "You must be the new guy. I'm Steve." Chuck's head whipped up and there was a head above the wall of his cubical.

"Hi," Chuck replied obviously startled. "I'm Chuck."

"Chuck, huh, I didn't know anybody still named their kids Chuck."

Chuck turned and found the head of a pretty girl above the cubical wall right in front of him. "Uh, my parents…are…are sadists…" Chuck finished lamely.

"Really?" the girl asked. "That must have made growing up very interesting."

"No…" Chuck shook his head. "It was a joke."

"Oh," the girl frowned and looked to Steve. "Did you get it?" Steve just shrugged. "Oh, well. So what's your story Chuck?"

"My story?" Chuck asked.

"Yeah, we're in the middle of the biggest Agency hiring freeze in years. We haven't had a new guy come on board since Tyler did seventeen months ago and he's already left. Then suddenly you show up, you must be pretty impressive. So what's impressive about you other than your pretty eyes?"

Chuck blinked. That was flirting. Chuck was no expert, but he was reasonably certain that was flirting. "Uh…" Chuck replied. "There's nothing impressive about me."

The girl smiled. "Well that's just not true. I already told you, you had impressively pretty eyes."

Steve rolled his eyes. "Seriously, what did they bring you in for? You must have something they really need."

"I don't know," Chuck replied. "Someone asked me to come to Washington to take some tests and a week later I'm sitting here."

The girl frowned at this explanation. "We've been trying to get additional staff for a year, you'd think they'd tell us if they're going to start hiring newbies again. I wonder if this means I can finally get my raise." Chuck shrugged helplessly. "Ooh, you're a number two!"

The girl turned away. "Richard, the new guy already has a higher security clearance than you do!" she called.

"No frick'n way!" Came an angry reply from a couple of cubicles away. A moment later another face appeared beside the girl. "What the heck? They're just giving new guys level two now? What's his story?"

"He claims he doesn't have one," the girl replied.

"Oh, one of those," Richard shook his head.

"One of what?" Chuck asked defensively.

The girl smiled. "One of those people who find themselves unremarkable. You wouldn't have gotten hired in this department if you were unremarkable. Everybody in this department is a genius. The CIA won't even think about putting you in here unless you are. So you're obviously intelligent and you've got some sort of story that makes you special. Steve there graduated from MIT at fourteen. Richard here wrote a program to optimize communications traffic on the internet when he was seventeen. It's still in use today. So you see, nobody who comes here, comes without a story."

"So what's your story?" Chuck asked.

"Oh no." the girl smirked. "If you want to know that, you have to take me to dinner first and you have to tell me yours."

"I can't believe you're level two, how'd you manage that?" Richard asked.

"Don't mind him, he's just sore because he's been here two years and is still at security clearance level one. He's the only one in the department that hasn't made at least level two. The girl lifted up her badge to show Chuck. Her name was Vanessa Thompson, security clearance level three.

"Putting the new guy through the ringer already?" Chuck whipped around to find Tom standing behind him. "I see you've met Steve, Richard and Vanessa," Tom nodded. "Did they tell you what they do?"

"No," Chuck replied. "They were mostly pumping me for information."

Tom smiled. "Well they're curious people by nature, that's why they work here. Richard and Vanessa work in the communications encryption. Steve here works in decryption programming which will be where you're starting out as well. You'll be working on Michael's project to start with. Let's go meet the rest of the crew."

Robert was in the cube next to Steve and then a man who had to have been in his sixties named Doug. Doug was apparently an expert in weapon systems encryption. Chuck wasn't even sure what that meant, but apparently had something to do with nuclear missiles.

Chuck was led around and met the other members of the department. He'd lost count, there had been at least seventeen of them so far. Some of them with offices, most of them had cubicles. The names were starting to run together when Tom introduced him to Derrick Martin.

Chuck held out his hand, but then his eyes rolled into the back of his head and a series of flashes appeared in front of him, IRS records, bank statements, code fragments and the Fulcrum alias, Gideon. Chuck staggered backwards. "Are you okay?" Derrick asked, clearly concerned.

"Oh, uh yeah, I think it's just first day jitters, you know." Chuck attempted to shrug it off.

"I was really nervous my first day too," Derrick sympathized, "but you come to figure out it's just like working for any other company."

"Yeah, thanks."

"So what's your specialty?" Derrick asked.

"Chuck's going to be working on optimizing decryption algorithms," Tom answered for him. "He has an incredible ability to recognize patterns and has shown an incredible tenacity for decryption."

"Is this the guy that slept on the table?" Derrick asked.

"The very one," Tom nodded.

Derrick shouted across the hall. "Hey, Simon, this is the guy that slept on the table during the decryption exam."

Simon popped out of his cube. "No way, that was you?"

Tom laughed and smacked Chuck on the shoulder. "You earned yourself quite a reputation around here with that little stunt. The exams are of course confidential, but I think that rumor broke loose about a day after it happened."

"I was just trying to find a way to clear my head," Chuck said dismissively. "It was no big deal."

"It was a big deal, I heard the staff went home during the test." Derrick laughed. "You have to let me buy you a beer sometime."

"Oh…all right."

Tom finished introducing him to the rest of the of the staff, there were twenty eight people in Chuck's department as well as two more departments that worked with data protection. Chuck's group mainly dealt with how to break encryption. Although a few people like Doug, Vanessa, Richard and Keith worked on protecting different critical systems. According to Tom the world of Cryptography was a constant game of can you top this between the encrypters and the decrypters. It sounded like a pretty lousy game to Chuck.

By the time Tom introduced him to Michael and sat him down in the other man's cube, Chuck was practically frantic.

"What's wrong?" Michael asked.

Chuck attempted to calm down. "Nothing, it's nothing."

"Okay, well, I'll go over the program overview and then how about some of the guys and I take you out to lunch?"

"Sounds terrific," Chuck replied flatly.

***

As it turned out Derrick was one of the people that decided to take Chuck out to lunch. Chuck sat shotgun and Derrick sat directly behind him, which made him very nervous. Simon was also in the car. Richard, Vanessa and Steve were taking a second car.

"What kind of car do you have, Chuck?" Derrick asked.

"Oh, I don't have a car."

"You take public transportation?"

"Yeah."

"Well that sucks, where do you live?"

"Severna Park," Chuck shrugged.

Michael whistled. "That's got to suck."

"Maybe I could stop by and pick you up," Derrick offered. "It'd only be like fifteen minutes out of my way and it would save you like an hour."

"No!" Chuck said a little too excitedly. "I, uh, I don't mind the commute."

"That's seriously crazy." Simon shook his head.

"Come on," Derrick offered again. "It's no big deal. It will save you a ton of time."

"It's okay, really. I don't want to be any trouble and the commute isn't a big deal."

Michael looked over at him from the driver's seat. "You are a seriously weird, dude, Chuck. Who are you texting?"

Chuck looked up from his phone. "Oh, uh, my sister, she worries."

"Wow, overbearing family, long commute, classified job you can't talk to anyone about. You live quite the life Chuckster," Derrick teased.

"Yeah I guess," Chuck mumbled. He completed his text to Sarah. _At lunch with Fulcum, help!_

He got a response a few minutes later. _Are you in danger?_

Chuck thought about it for a moment. _I don't think so_

_Stay calm I'll be there. _


	12. Chapter 12 A Daunting Task

_**Disclaimer:**_ _Have you ever wanted something really badly and you begged your parents for it at every birthday and Christmas for years? Then the day comes and you tear open all your packages and you figure out that they didn't get you what you really wanted. It's not their fault exactly, maybe you were asking for too much? Maybe it just wasn't available. Or maybe it just wasn't something they could give you. See, that's the way I am with the rights for Chuck. I keep asking, but I still don't own Chuck and every Christmas I open my packages and no matter what I did get, I'm just a little disappointed._

Chapter 12: A Daunting Task

They were actually most of the way done with lunch before Chuck heard from Sarah again. It was just a short text message.

_Meet me in the bathroom, last stall_

Chuck excused himself and made his way to the men's bathroom. He was curious as to why this particular rendezvous point was selected. When he got there, there was another man using a urinal. Chuck sidled up next to him and pretended to be going as well.

"How's it going?" Chuck asked the man. The guy shot him a dirty look but didn't answer. After he washed his hands and left, Chuck zipped back up and knocked on the third stall. The latch unlocked and there was Sarah in a baseball cap and a jumpsuit that had the name Carl sewn into the chest.

"That guy was so rude." Sarah shook her head.

"It's er kind of bathroom etiquette you aren't supposed to talk to a guy at the urinal," Chuck answered.

"Well that's dumb, what if you're friends?"

"Even then. Sarah why are you in the _men's _ room?"

"We needed to meet some place we wouldn't be seen," she explained. "And apparently you're in close contact with a Fulcrum agent."

"I don't think he's an agent." Chuck shook his head. "I just think he's selling secrets to Fulcrum."

"How do you know?"

"The flash, it didn't seem to indicate he was working for them, just that he'd made several large sales to Fulcrum. It was a combination of data from the government intersect and Fulcrum's. The info from Fulcrum indicated he didn't have knowledge of the organization, he was an external contact codenamed Gideon."

"Chuck, that intel is almost two years old a lot could have changed…"

"I know, but he doesn't seem like Fulcrum. I mean he's a nice guy, he offered to come get me and take me to work, so I don't have to ride the bus."

"What did you tell him?"

"I rather lamely explained that I like taking the bus."

"I will take care of this. Just try and stay away from him."

"Sure. I really don't think he's like _dangerous_."

"Did you think Jill was _dangerous_?" Sarah asked. The sarcasm in her voice was light, but it was there. Chuck blushed and studied his shoes. He had no reply to that. He'd never had a good excuse for the way Jill manipulated him.

"Chuck…" Sarah said softly clearly realizing she'd struck a low blow. But then the door of the men's room swung open and Sarah put her arms around Chuck's neck and jumped onto him wrapping her legs around him. "Shh," she whispered softly into his ear. They listened as the man using the bathroom made all sorts of indiscreet noises. Before that man finished his business, two more men entered the bathroom, one of them taking a seat in the stall next to Chuck and Sarah. After a couple of minutes Chuck's arms and legs started to burn from holding up Sarah's weight. He forgot all about that when he felt Sarah start to trace a line of kisses along his jaw. It was then that he really realized exactly which part of Sarah he was holding onto and just how tightly she was clinging to him.

When the bathroom mercifully cleared out again, Chuck put Sarah down and rubbed his aching biceps. "See, covert work does have it's upside." Chuck stared at her. The sparkle that had been completely missing from her eyes since the meeting with Beckman was back in full force.

"You enjoyed that?" Chuck whispered.

"Didn't you?" Sarah asked. "It felt like you did."

Chuck blushed once again. He shook his head. "Here I thought national security was at risk."

Sarah shrugged. "That's not my problem anymore. My concern is your security. I'll report what you found to Beckman and see what she wants to do about it. Just stay away from him. I'm not going to be able to follow you very closely."

"Why not?"

"I didn't have a car at the office, when you left for lunch I had to go borrow one, but I can't borrow that same car again. They might be looking for it by now. So I'm going to have to find another way back to the office."

"You STOLE a car?" Chuck asked far too loudly.

"Say it a little louder," Sarah whispered angrily. "I didn't have a choice, I didn't hurt it. I'll call in a tip to the police when I get back to the office. I just needed a ride and I didn't think about that fact that your coworkers might take you out to lunch. Usually everyone just eats in the cafeteria, or not too far from headquarters. You need to go; we've been in here too long already."

Chuck left Sarah behind and returned to his table. There were a few jokes about how long Chuck was in the bathroom, but nobody seemed to make much of it. Chuck's coworkers split the bill so that Chuck didn't have to pay, but they informed him that he had to buy all of them a beer upon the receipt of his first paycheck.

They headed back to the office. Avoiding Derrick turned out to be surprisingly easy as Richard and Vanessa climbed into Michael's car, while Derrick and Simon rode with Steve.

Vanessa who'd ended up in the front seat turned around so she could look at him. "So, Chuck, where'd you go to college?"

"Stanford."

"Nice," Vanessa nodded. "I went to Missouri, didn't exactly help me when I started looking for a job."

"How did you end up working for the NSA?" Chuck asked.

"I used to work at HighCOMM with Simon, when they needed someone with experience in telecommunications he recommended me, next thing I knew I was here." Chuck nodded. "So is everyone in the department really friendly?" Chuck asked.

Vanessa shrugged. "It depends. Some of the real math geeks don't really know how to talk to people. But there's only a couple of people who are hard to get along with in the department."

"Gerald," Richard coughed. He then fake coughed a few more times. "Sorry, I had something stuck in my throat."

"Gerald isn't that bad," Michael admonished him.

"You only say that because he listens to you."

Michael shook his head but didn't say anything further.

"So, Chuck, you have a girlfriend?" Vanessa asked.

"VAN!" Michael barked warningly.

"What?" She looked over at Michael. "It's a perfectly innocent question. I'm just trying to get to know our newbie."

Richard laughed nervously and Vanessa asked again. "So what of it, Chuck, you have a special lady friend?"

"Uh…no. Not as such."

"What does that mean? Not as such?" Vanessa quirked an eyebrow at him.

Chuck shook his head. "No, just, no, not yet anyway."

"Ooh, are you in the market?"

Chuck mentally kicked himself. "Yes…no…I don't know."

Vanessa gave him a calculating look. "You do like girls, right?"

"VAN!" Michael shouted angrily and even louder than before.

"What?" she asked.

"Could you just leave him alone for a day, please?"

Vanessa sat down in her seat and glared at Michael. "Honestly, I was just being friendly."

For some reason this caused Richard to snort. They pulled back into the NSA parking lot about a minute later, so Chuck never figured out what exactly Richard thought was funny.

***

Michael commandeered a conference room after lunch and they spent the afternoon going through the dataflow of the program Michael had been working on for the last seven months. The green sections were the parts that had already been coded. Chuck boggled at the sheer scope of the project. There were so many parts and interworking pieces. He was amazed and he told Michael so.

"Yeah, there are _too_ many pieces. That's a big part of the problem. I'm pretty sure it'll work, but to crack the encryption you'd need to run it for month on a BlueGene. If we don't make it more efficient M7D 1024 might never be broken. That's why you're here."

"Me?" Chuck asked.

"Yeah, Tom says you have a talent for finding patterns and comprehending complex data sets, we want to see if you can help us find the inefficiencies in my code."

"You want me to review _all _of the code?"

"Well…yeah. You didn't think that working for the NSA was going to be all glamour work did you?"

Chuck's eyes bugged. "You're assuming I even understand what your code does."

"Don't worry about it. I'll help you out at first and you'll get the hang of it."

Chuck shook his head. "_Well that makes me feel better_."

Michael laughed. "You can't be burnt out yet, we haven't even started." Michael proceeded to explain the complexities of recursive encryption and how keys worked with the cipher.

Chuck felt like his head was going to explode. "What time is it?"

Michael looked at his watch. "Quarter to six, you need to jet?"

Chuck blinked. "Crap, I missed my bus."

"No problem, we'll work a little longer and then I'll take you home."

"That's okay, I'll catch the next one."

Michael shook his head. "Suit yourself, it's no problem though."

Just then Vanessa stuck her head into the conference room. "Chuck, do you need a ride?"

"I've got it covered," Michael replied.

Vanessa gave him an irritated look. "Okay then, have a good night you two. Chuck, I'll see you tomorrow."

"Goodnight." Chuck gave her a little wave.

Michael sighed. "Yeah, if you haven't figured it out already, watch out for Van."

"Why do you call her Van?"

"Everyone does, except for Tom. Vanessa is a little too girly for this department. She's been the only girl in this department for like ten years."

"You two have a history?" Chuck asked.

"Yeah," Michael nodded.

"Okay, no problem, steer clear of Vanessa. I got it."

"It's not like that…" Michael winced. "Van is a really nice person, smart, funny, fun to hang out with. You'll like her, she'll insist upon it. Just be careful, she has a history with coworkers and she's got her eye on you."

"Why me?"

Michael shook his head. "Because you're new and Van likes _collecting_ her coworkers. Which if you're into it, that's totally cool, it's just she's left a trail of broken hearts all over the department. So just be prepared. That's all I'm saying."

"Don't worry about me, I…I don't think Van is really my type."

"Smart, pretty and fun, yeah that really turns a lot of guys off," Michael replied sarcastically.

Chuck gave Michael a tight smile. "I'm sure she's great."

"She is. Look, why don't you go ahead and get out of here. We'll pick this up in the morning."

***

"Finally," Sarah huffed when she walked by Chuck at the bus stop.

Chuck wanted to protest that he didn't have any control over it, but she'd already walked away and was standing by herself a short distance from him.

Chuck and Sarah rode the bus separated by several seats. After riding the bus for a good ten miles or so they both got off and walked to the car separated by several paces. They slipped into the car and drove without speaking for several blocks. "Sorry I got out of there so late," Chuck finally said. "Michael wanted to keep working, it was hard to get away.

"It's not a big deal. It's just going to be a long night."

"What are we doing?" Chuck asked.

"_We _aren't doing anything. I'm taking you home and then I'm going to go neutralize the Derrick Burroughs situation."

"You're going to kill him?" Chuck squeaked in indignation.

"No, at least not yet, we've been checking his banking records more carefully. We don't have enough to arrest him officially, but General Beckman is convinced we can dig something up or break him once we have him in custody."

"What does that mean for me?" Chuck asked.

"For now, you just have to stay home, while I deal with this. There's no reason for him suspect you. I started working on his floor a week ago and I'll be questioning him, if it get's back to Fulcum, they'll know it was me, but they already think I'm CIA. It's not a great situation, but there isn't anybody else I can trust to question him."

"What about Casey?" Chuck asked.

"Casey doesn't have the necessary clearance anymore," Sarah shook her head. "He doesn't work for the NSA."

"I thought you weren't a field agent anymore either."

Sarah shrugged. "This is a special circumstance. I have the requisite knowledge and I'm the person with the most invested. At the end of the day it's still about stopping Fulcrum."

"I thought we were done with this," Chuck replied somewhat bitterly.

Sarah reached across the small distance between them and squeezed his arm. "So did I, but I think Beckman has always underestimated you. They ran Derrick's info through the new intersect and it didn't find anything suspicious enough to trigger a flag. It doesn't shock me that you're better than some machine. General Beckman never understood how amazing you are."

Chuck tried not to let the pride swell inside of him. It was stupid to be proud of something you hated about yourself, but Chuck and the Intersect were tied together. It worked because of him. He was remarkable because of it and that's why Sarah was here now. Chuck sighed. "Just please don't kill him, he seems like a good guy."

"Chuck, I can't promise you that, I'll do whatever it takes to protect you. If he becomes a threat to you…"

"Sarah, he's just some programmer who made a mistake."

"Based on what? The one day you've known him? Chuck how many people may have died because of the secrets Derrick sold?"

Chuck crossed his arms and stared at the floor of the car. He hated the spy world.

_A/N: Hey there, your friendly neighborhood author here. I just wanted to take a moment to encourage you to go vote in the 2009 Awesome Awards. They are being held in JMG's Chuck forum right here on and it's a great way to support your favorite author. Even if you can never figure out what to say in a review, you can just go vote. Well…not for me, but still, you can vote for your favorite author. _


	13. Chapter 13 Learning to Kiss

_**Disclaimer**__: Once upon a time there was a little boy named Chuck. Chuck met a really hot girl named Sarah and they fell in love. One day Chuck proposed to Sarah and said, "Sarah I've never been happier, let's spend the rest of our lives together." _

"_We can't," she replied._

"_Why not?" Chuck asked indignantly. _

"_Because we're not owned by Altonish. we're owned by NBC and they will never let us be happy." _

"_Oh," Chuck replied sadly. "Bummer."_

Chapter 13: Learning to Kiss

"Chuck, please don't be upset." Sarah asked pleadingly.

"I'm not, I just feel bad."

"Chuck, please this is a good thing, you helped catch a criminal." Sarah reached out awkwardly for him. She didn't seem to know what to do exactly, she pulled her hand back. She seemed to steel herself momentarily and then she reached forward and hugged him. "This is necessary. Derrick caused this a long time ago when he first took money from Fulcrum."

"I know," Chuck sighed. "It's just hard. He's friends with everyone at work, what are they going to be told?"

"I don't know, until we find out how cooperative he's going to be, there's no way to tell. If he cooperates fully, he'll probably do a long stint in prison. If he's difficult he could get the death penalty." Chuck grimaced and Sarah reached up and soothed his face. "Selling government secrets is treason Chuck, the penalties for treason…well, they include death."

"Right."

"Come on, there's something I have to show you. I was hoping it might be a while before we had to go over this, but I'm going to have to leave you alone tonight, so here we go." Sarah dragged Chuck downstairs. In darkest corner of the basement she shifted some of Chuck's boxes around and then pulled down on the light sconce. To Chuck's amazement a panel on the wall opened up. Sarah punched the green button and with a puff of dust the wall moved. Sarah grasped the end of the wall and it swung open. The door must have been nine inches thick of solid steel. Chuck shuddered to think how much it must weigh. With the door out of the way there was a large black hole. Sarah walked into the middle of the room and pulled a string hanging from the ceiling and a light popped on.

"What is this?" Chuck asked.

"This is the safe room."

"Our house has a safe room?"

"Every house in the complex has a safe room. It's not much…" She wasn't kidding. There were three concrete walls, the door, the string for the light, a phone that appeared to be from 1960 and the floor. The room was maybe six foot by eight foot. "But it will keep you safe if someone tries to get into the house when I'm gone."

"This looks more like a tomb than a safe room," Chuck observed.

"It will keep you safe. I'd hoped to work on it a bit before we had to use it for the first time. You know, put some chairs and maybe a cot in here. Some water, food and maybe something to keep you from being bored, but I need to go take care of Derrick and I haven't had time yet. This is important, if the house alarms go off or you think someone's trying to get in, you come here immediately and close the door. It'll seal, but you'll be safe until I can come get you."

"Is this really necessary?"

Sarah looked at him pleadingly. "Please, Chuck…"

"What happens if I need to get out?"

"If the door is closed without the code being input it will trigger a call to me and to General Beckman. We're the only two people who know how to open this door. I will come for you, no matter what."

"Sarah, I…"

"I know it's not very homey, we'll fix it up, but this will keep you safe. Promise me if you're in danger you'll use it."

Chuck looked at Sarah skeptically, but her eyes were so pleading. "All right, I promise."

Sarah stepped forward and hugged him. "Thank you."

"So what's the code to open it?"

"If it's not in alarm, you just push the green button, but once you flip this latch. Sarah showed him the latch on the door. You can only open it from the outside."

"So I don't get to know the code?"

Sarah bit her lip and shook her head. "Sorry."

"You don't trust me?" Chuck asked indignantly.

"I trust you to keep the code secret," Sarah explained. "But if the people on the other side of the door are threatening me, I don't trust you not to tell them how to open it."

"But if they were going to kill you…" Chuck started to object.

"That's exactly why you can't know the code."

Chuck frowned. "Sarah, that's not fair, you'd just make me sit in here while they killed you?"

Sarah gave him a sad smile. "I know that you'd trade your life for mine. I know with certainty, that you wouldn't even think about it. That you'd beg them to take you and let me live. As much as I love how knowing that makes me feel, tactically trading you for my life is always the wrong decision."

"How can you say that?" Chuck demanded.

"Because I know! I know what happens to you, if someone captures you. I've been tortured, Chuck, it's not okay for you to go through that."

"So I'm supposed to just watch you die?"

"There are no camera feeds into the safe room. You wouldn't have to watch."

Chuck closed his eyes. He felt sick. He felt Sarah kiss him on the cheek. "I have to go. Promise you'll use the room if someone tries to get in."

"We aren't done talking about this," Chuck growled. He opened his eyes and stared at Sarah who seemed hesitant to make eye contact.

"I know…" Sarah replied. "I know. We'll talk about it when I get home. I just need to know that you'll keep yourself safe tonight."

"I promise," Chuck reiterated. They left the safe room and closed the door. Sarah pressed the red X and door clanked shut and the panel on the wall slid back into place. Chuck shook his head. _Who knew houses in the suburbs came equipped with such things?_

"I'm going to go change."

And change she did, when she came back out of their bedroom she was dressed in heavy black pants and black jacket. Chuck was sitting on the couch staring at the wall. He barely noticed as she flipped open one of the bricks on the fireplace and punched a code into the keypad underneath. The hearth for the fireplace slid out revealing an impressive stash of weapons. Sarah started arming herself.

"Are there any other secret compartments in the house I should be aware of?" Chuck asked.

Sarah was bent over her weapons locker selecting throwing knives and slipping them into concealed locations on her outfit. "I'll never tell," she replied with a smirk. She slid her weapons locker closed and walked over to where Chuck was sitting on the couch.

"Do I get a kiss for luck?" she asked.

Chuck raised his eyebrows. "Um, okay." He stood up and extended an arm towards Sarah. It was awkward, it just didn't feel right. Their kisses were normally filled with passion and fire…this was just a moment between the couple that they weren't…yet. Chuck finally managed to snake his arm around her and pull her in, but the kiss wasn't quite right and Sarah seemed to sense it too, they only kissed for a moment and then she pulled away.

"You'll be safe won't you?"

"I'll do my best." Chuck hated that answer. It wasn't a yes. That was just Sarah avoiding the question.

"Okay, I'll see you tonight?"

Sarah shook her head. "I have no idea when I'll be back, but I'll be back to take you to work in the morning. There's frozen pizza in the …well in the freezer."

"That's not pizza."

Sarah shrugged. "I'll buy you a real one later this week. Just stay inside…okay?"

"I feel like I'm ten."

Sarah frowned. "I'm sorry. I don't mean to make you feel controlled. I don't mean to make you feel left behind. But I have to go do this, it's important."

"I get it," Chuck shrugged. "I wish I could help."

"You already did. I'll see you soon." Sarah reached up and kissed him on the cheek. Somehow that one transferred more feeling than their earlier attempt. Her hand trailed down his arm finally squeezing his hand when she reached it. "I'll be back." With that she walked away without looking back.

Chuck settled down on the couch and started reading through the NSA policy manuals. It was dreary, boring reading about who you could talk to and who you couldn't talk to. It gave detailed information on how secret information was classified and handled. There were seven levels of information security. Chuck was a level two, but based on the descriptions he knew a whole lot of level seven stuff that he shouldn't know.

Chuck eventually over cooked himself some frozen pizza. It tasted eerily like the box he'd removed it from.

A little after eight he got a call from Ellie.

"Hey, El."

"Yeah, we're good, getting settled in."

"Oh went to the store and bought some furniture, ran errands, you know, the usual."

"Well, yes, I know that Sarah and I don't have a usual yet, but it was just the usual stuff people do. How are you guys."

"Yeah, well it's only been a few days."

"I started looking today, yeah, no hits so far."

"I'm sure I'll find something soon."

"It's good. It's really good. We still have lots of surprises for each other."

"Yeah, even after three years."

"No, we still haven't talked about getting married."

"We aren't at that place in our lives yet."

"Thanks, yes, I am aware that I'm not getting any younger, but that's a big step and I'm not going to rush into it."

"I'm not sure, Ellie, it might be a couple more years…"

"Please don't yell at me."

"I know, I'll let you know as soon as I find something."

"No, she's out at the moment."

"She uh…went shopping."

"Sure you can try her, but I'm not sure if she'll pick up."

"Yeah, I love you too, I'll talk to you soon."

Chuck hung up the phone and shook his head. _Sisters_

He went back to his reading. As the hours ticked by, Chuck wondered how anybody was supposed to read the policy manuals and get something from them. What Chuck was sure of, was that if you were concerned about your girlfriend, or whatever Sarah was and trying to wait up until she got home, reading NSA policy manuals was not a good way to keep you awake.

***

"Chuck"

"What?" Chuck's head jerked up. Sarah was standing in front of him. "Hey…I must have fallen asleep."

"Good." Sarah nodded. "You weren't supposed to wait up for me."

Chuck found that moving his neck was painful. He'd fallen asleep on the couch with his head tilted back, that was apparently not a comfortable way to sleep. "I was worried about you."

"Obviously, you were on pins and needles," There was disdain in Sarah's voice, but her eyes gave her away, she was teasing him.

"I was, I was trying to make it through this." Chuck waved at the NSA policy manuals. "How did you get through all of this?"

"I didn't."

"But I thought it was required," Chuck objected.

"Only if you are an employee of the NSA, lucky for me, I'm not paid by the NSA."

"Well that's a dirty trick…"

"I thought it was rather good planning on my part."

"What happened with Derrick?"

"He's fine, he's agreed to cooperate and I didn't shoot him. Although for a while I really wanted to. He's been selling secrets to Fulcrum for three years. Practically the whole time we've been fighting Fulcrum."

"You ready for bed?" Chuck asked.

"Chuck it's six thirty; we were supposed to be up twenty minutes ago." Sarah shook her head at him.

"Seriously? Have you slept at all?"

"No."

"Can you sleep at the office?"

"I'm supposed to be protecting you at the office. _That's my job._"

"Well, crap, that sucks."

"Come on, we're wasting time." Sarah headed for the bathroom to take a shower, while Chuck pretended to start getting ready. Instead he went into the kitchen and cobbled together breakfast. It was simple, but Chuck hoped Sarah would like it, French toast with coffee.

As soon as the water shut off he heard Sarah yell. "Chuck, what are you doing?"

"Nothing!" Chuck yelled back.

"Right, nothing," Sarah said a few minutes later coming out in her bathrobe with a towel wrapped around her head.

"I'm making you breakfast," Chuck explained.

"Chuck, that's sweet, but we really are pressed for time."

"I know, so go get dressed while I finish up and then you can eat while I get ready."

"What about you?"

"Don't worry about me."

"But I like worrying about you," Sarah pouted.

Chuck gave her a wide toothy grin. "Go get dressed, as you've pointed out we're short on time."

Chuck finished Sarah's breakfast even doctoring her coffee the way she liked. Mostly to put so much other stuff in it that you could no longer taste the coffee. Chuck wondered what the point was, but he hated coffee, so what did he know. Given the choice he'd rather mainline Mountain Dew at 8AM than drink coffee.

Chuck showered quickly and put on a sleeveless white button down and gray pants. He grabbed a tie and headed back out towards the kitchen. He was walking across the living room when Sarah spotted him. "Sleeves, Chuck"

"What?"

"This is the real world not the Buy More, in the real world when you wear a button down shirt it includes long sleeves."

"Really?"

"Always."

"But I don't like long sleeves."

"Fashion always comes before comfort."

"It does?" Chuck asked. "Are you sure?"

"Yep."

"Really?"

"Yep."

"I don't know that, that's a logical argument—" Chuck started.

"Just go change your shirt." Sarah cut him off in a tone that suggested their argument was over.

Chuck frowned, but dutifully turned around and headed back to the bedroom. Most of his clothes were horribly wrinkled from the move. He pulled out a yellow and green plaid button down that wasn't too wrinkled and put in on. When he got back the dining room Sarah was just finishing her French toast. The expression on her face told him she was exceedingly pleased.

"That shirt's hideous, Chuck." She shook her head. "But it's still better than a short sleeve white button down."

"This one belonged to my dad."

"I know you have better ones, I've seen you wear them…Granted you always roll up your sleeves, but they're better than this one. What happened to the shirt you wore on our date?"

Chuck's eyebrows shot up. "That shirt was sixty dollars!"

Sarah rolled her eyes. "We're going to have to work on your wardrobe." She stood up and approached Chuck almost predatorily. Chuck backed up until he hit the couch and had no where else to move to. Sarah slid her had behind his head and pulled him in until their lips met. It was soft and slow and sweet, it had everything their kiss the night before had been missing. "Thank you for breakfast," she said throatily. Then she kissed him again.

"I thought we were running late," Chuck gasped when she pulled back again.

"We are, it's a good thing I have a very fast car. Come on, let's go."

Chuck took a deep breath before he followed after Sarah. He decided that the next greatest invention was not going to be peppermint flavored maple syrup, but man, what a kiss…

_A/N: Sorry this is late. Life is being unkind to the writing. I'm doing my best folks, hang in there with me. _


	14. Chapter 14 Aggressive Negotiating

_**Disclaimer:**__ Yada, Yada, Yada, I don't own Chuck. _

Chapter 14: Aggressive Negotiating

Sarah's impersonation of Danica Patrick and catching a slightly later stop than the one they'd caught the day before, did allow them to get to work on time. Chuck was beginning to think with the way Sarah drove that perhaps she needed her own commercial, but he resisted the urge to tell her that.

Chuck settled down with Michael in the conference room for another boring day of learning about the application flow of the project he was supposed to be making more efficient. The highlight of his day was actually catching a look at Sarah during lunch in the NSA cafeteria. She was two tables away and facing him. Chuck watched her as she ate her lunch alone.

"Earth to Chuck, over!"

"What?"

"I asked you which video games you like to play," Van pouted.

"You did?"

"Yeah, you've been spaced out for a few minutes. What's the matter, you like that girl or something?" Michael asked.

Van's head immediately whipped around and started scanning the room. "What girl?"

"No, no, I think we ride the bus together," Chuck tried to shrug it off.

Michael whistled. "No wonder you like taking the bus. She works on our floor, I think."

"What girl?" Van demanded.

"It's nobody," Chuck shook his head. "Um, the last video game I played much of was _The Hoard_.

"Eugh," Van turned up her nose. "Ogre games."

"What do you play?"

"Van is the queen of the MMORPGs." Simon supplied. "You need anything for your _Second Life_ character, just let her know, she has access to everything."

"Oh, I've never really played that."

"Why not?" Van asked. "It's tons of fun."

"I've just been short on free time the last several years. My friends Morgan and Anna play around with it a bit, but I never got into it."

"I could help you make a character!" Van offered.

"That's okay, I'm not sure how much time I'm going to have for goofing off. I'll let you know though."

Van looked a little disappointed, but turned back to her lunch.

"So where is Derrick?" Van asked.

"I don't know, I left him a couple of texts, but he hasn't responded." Simon shrugged. "Maybe he's sick, he seemed fine yesterday though."

"Maybe he was sick of working and went to the Orioles game," Michael suggested.

"Naw, Derrick wouldn't skip without telling me," Simon disagreed.

Chuck glanced at Sarah as his coworkers discussed their missing friend. He didn't want to call attention to himself so he quickly looked back down at his lunch.

"Maybe we should give him a call?" Van offered.

"I'm sure he's fine. We'll find out tomorrow what exciting thing was too good to pass up in order to join us at work."

"I bet it's a girl. You know how Derrick is when he gets a new girl," Van offered.

"You'd know, wouldn't you?" Michael asked sarcastically.

"Bite me," Van replied angrily.

"What's that about?" Chuck asked Simon quietly.

"Don't mind them. They're an old married couple."

Van turned and let go with a full punch to Simon's shoulder as hard as she could, which was apparently significant because Simon yelped and grabbed his arm. "Jeez, Van, it was a joke."

"I know, don't joke about me like that." She turned towards Chuck. "Michael has _issues _with the people I choose to date."

"I do not."

"Then keep your mouth shut about it," Van shot back.

"You and Derrick are a couple?" Chuck asked.

"Not for a long time." Van shook her head. "We're just friends."

"Well, Chuck, shall we get back to it?" Michael asked after a few moments.

"Sounds grand," Chuck grimaced.

"Michael, don't bore him to death his first week, okay?" Van asked.

"I'm just teaching him about M7D encryption and how we're going to break it with Sabertooth."

"Yeah, that's what I was afraid of." Van gave Chuck a sympathetic wink.

***

There was an actual meeting going on in the conference room later that afternoon so for the very first time Chuck got to sit at his desk and actually work. He looked down the hallway at Sarah and found her hunched over her desk. He sent her a text message.

_How RU _

Sarah's head popped up from whatever she was bent over as she reached for her phone. When she read the message she looked at him and gave him a smile, but it was difficult to make out from the distance between them. He saw her typing into her phone.

_I'm fine, tired._

A moment later

_Need to get you home on time, another meeting tonight._

Chuck sent back a sad face and Sarah texted him.

_Turn around, you shouldn't watch me._

Chuck frowned, but he turned around and started opening the diagrams he and Michael had been going over previously.

***

"So, what, are you just never going to sleep? Chuck asked later that evening.

"No, I don't think it'll take all night, but I don't have any other time to do this."

"Sarah, you're exhausted."

"I know, I am, but this is important and it can't wait, I have to be there at six."

"This sucks."

"Oh, go setup your computer. You won't even miss me."

Sarah stepped forward and pressed a quick kiss to his cheek before she turned and left.

Chuck watched her walk away and shook his head. It sucked that all of this had to happen right when they were really getting to know each other. He felt like he'd barely seen her since the weekend. He took her advice though and spent a few hours down in the basement arranging his stuff.

He made himself a simple dinner and tried to read the NSA policy manuals. Without getting much sleep the night before, he just couldn't make any headway. Finally at ten he tossed the manual away and got ready for bed. He awoke sometime after midnight when Sarah snuggled into him. He put an arm around her and she pulled it more tightly around her and held onto it.

"Hi," Chuck mumbled sleepily.

"Hi," Sarah whispered. "Go back to sleep."

***

Chuck awoke to the alarm going off still wrapped around Sarah. She had her hand clasped over his and their fingers were intertwined. Chuck was sure she must be awake, but she hadn't moved. Finally she disentangled their hands and reached over to press the snooze button. He was surprised when she turned over and lay down with her leg thrown over him and her head on his shoulder.

"Morning," Chuck said.

"Morning," Sarah mumbled she took a deep breath and snuggled even closer.

"Do we need to get up?" Chuck asked.

"Nope," Sarah replied. "I get eight more minutes to just lay here."

"Should I go grab a quick shower then?"

Sarah's arm tightened around him. "Not for eight more minutes."

Chuck was content to lay there with Sarah, so he settled in and rubbed her side gently.

"Did everything go okay last night?"

Sarah sighed. "We have to talk about it, but later. I don't want to talk about it right now."

"What happened?"

"Chuck, this is my favorite part of the day. It's the only part of the day that I get to just be with you. Can we talk about it later?"

"Sure."

Sarah's alarm went off again and she grunted. She pressed her face into his shirt and took a deep breath before she rolled over and shut off the alarm. "Well, Chuck, shall we get to it?" Sarah stood up and walked into the bathroom. It was only then that Chuck realized that she was wearing the clothes she'd had on the day before sans her pants.

Chuck made his way to the second bathroom to start getting ready himself. He was curious how long Sarah could keep this up, how long she'd have to keep it up? Is this what she wanted? Maybe she enjoyed getting to be a real agent in the evenings. Certainly the Susie homemaker act was eventually going to wear a little thin on someone like Sarah.

Chuck turned on the coffee maker, since he'd managed to get ready before her. Unfortunately, Sarah had lousy taste in cereal and he sat down with bowl of Bran Flakes. He was curious why the FDA had approved cardboard as a breakfast food. Two tablespoons of sugar did little to improve the flavor.

"MMM, you made coffee," Sarah cooed when she came out of the back of the house dressed for work. "I could get used to this."

"So what do we need to talk about?" Chuck asked.

Sarah who'd been about to put the mug to her lips, lowered it again. "Wow, you really get started early in the day." Sarah took a sip of her coffee before she set the mug back on the table and started peeling a banana. "The FBI and NSA want me to take a lead role in the investigation surrounding Derrick's information. The FBI doesn't have anybody experienced with Fulcrum operations and the NSA thinks I'm the best person to run their internal investigation."

"Wow," Chuck nodded.

"I'm turning them down." Sarah shrugged.

"What? Why? This sounds like a great opportunity."

Sarah shook her head. "I can't do that and protect you. I'd never be around."

"It sounds like they need you though…"

"They don't need _me._ They could just as easily have Casey run this operation. The fact that I captured Derrick is of little consequence and besides we only found out about Derrick because of you. All I did was leading a team to arrest him."

"So why didn't they ask Casey to do it?"

"I'm guessing bad feelings between Beckman and Agent Casey. She seems pretty insistent on burning him. I think she's only pushing for me to lead this investigation because if I say yes then she could put you in the bunker like she wanted to in the first place, but not until after she's done with you of course."

Chuck eyed Sarah carefully. "What do you mean, done with me?"

"The other thing that came up last night is that Beckman wants you to rotate around the NSA departments and see if you flash on any other current NSA employees."

"You mean I'm getting a new job already?"

"No," Sarah shook her head. "This would be in addition to your current responsibilities. She's coming up with a reason for you to need to interview people in other departments."

"Fantastic."

"Yeah, I was sure you'd be thrilled about that, but if you can root out Fulcrum operatives inside the NSA, that would be critically important."

"Right, the duty," Sarah nodded and reached out to run a hand across Chuck's shoulders. "So what about you?" Chuck asked.

"What about me?"

"Don't you think you should consider taking this position? It's an important job, something you'd be good at."

"Chuck, I didn't reject it outright because I thought before I announced a big decision like this that I should talk to you. I think that's what couples do… But I'm not taking the job."

Chuck reached over and grabbed Sarah's hand. "I just want you to have a job you enjoy, can you really say that you like what you're doing at the NSA?"

Sarah looked everywhere but at Chuck. "It's okay."

"That's what I thought. I don't want you to be miserable every day for the rest of your life. Can't you understand that?"

"Can't you understand that I don't want you to be miserable everyday for the rest of _your _life?" Sarah replied angrily. She finally made eye contact with him. "One of us has to make sacrifices, you sacrificed enough when you got turned into the Intersect, when you couldn't lead a normal life, when you had to leave your family to come here. So I made some sacrifices too, why is that so hard for you to accept?"

"I don't want you to have to do it for me," Chuck muttered.

Sarah squeezed his hand. "Hey, if not for you, then who?"

"Maybe we can work something out?" Chuck suggested. "Maybe since Beckman needs you she'll be more willing to negotiate."

Sarah shook her head. "Beckman doesn't need me, the FBI wants me and Beckman wants me to go, so that she'll get her way regarding you. It's not happening, Chuck, you are not a point of negotiation for me."

"Sarah…"

"We'll have to talk about it later, we need to go or we'll be late."

"We _are _going to talk about it later."

"_Fine,_" Sarah sighed. They cleared the table and Sarah grabbed her purse before they headed for the door. When they got to the door Sarah stopped.

"What's wrong?"

"Nothing," Sarah replied hesitantly. She took a step towards him and kissed him quickly on the lips.

"What was that for?" Chuck asked.

Sarah shrugged. "Do I still need a reason?" she asked cocking her head to the side.

"I guess not, it's just weird."

"Weird?"

"It's just…well we only ever used to kiss in public. Now we only do it in private. It's weird."

Sarah gave him a challenging look. "Get use to it." She said in a no nonsense tone. "We'll be kissing in public before you know it." Then she smiled and winked at him.

Sarah opened the door and walked outside and Chuck watched her walk away. He really wished he had some idea what the rules of this relationship were. Sometimes they were so close… "Chuck, come on!" Sarah called. Chuck shook his head and walked out the door. Another day of grinding at the NSA.

***

"I'm kind of worried, it's not like him to just disappear."

"He probably just had some personal emergency, I'm sure he's fine."

"But he never misses practice."

"Come on, it's not that big a deal. I still think he's shacked up with some girl."

"Derrick would answer his cell phone, though."

"Not if she was really hot…"

"Come on, Van, who's Derrick going to find that's that hot? Ow… Um, present company accepted?"

"Yeah and don't forget it."

"I just don't think of you as a hookup for Derrick, that's all. OW! What was that one for?"

"You shouldn't think of me as a _hookup _for anyone. Is that what you considered our relationship?"

"We only had two dates…"

"I thought it was special."

"It was…"

Chuck put on his headphones trying to drown out the sounds of Vanessa and Richard arguing on the opposite side of his cubicle wall. He was still wearing them an hour later when someone touched Chuck on the shoulder. He nearly jumped out of his skin.

"Kind of jumpy there," Vanessa observed.

"Sorry, I was…I was, um, thinking."

"Well it's good to know the NSA isn't paying you for nothing," Vanessa teased.

Chuck gave her a small grin. "Some of the guys and I are going over to Subway for lunch. You want to come with us?"

"Oh…that's okay, you guys go ahead."

Vanessa frowned. "You have other plans?"

"No," Chuck shook his head. "I'll probably just grab something in the cafeteria."

Vanessa shook her head and reached down and grabbed Chuck's wrist. "No you're not, you're coming with us." She pulled on Chuck's arm. Chuck laughed slightly and allowed himself to be pulled out of his chair.

"Subway is that important, huh?" Chuck asked as Vanessa tugged him out of his cubicle.

"Subway is great. They have delicious food for low prices. Did you know that you can get a foot long sandwich for just five dollars?"

"Seems like kind of a lot of sandwich for just one person…"

"The point is you're supposed to be bonding with us. Habitual shyness is no reason not to make friends with your coworkers." Vanessa turned and rolled her eyes at him. "Highly intelligent men are so dumb sometimes." She squeezed where she was holding his wrist and then slid her hand down and intertwined their fingers. Chuck panicked slightly and glanced behind him. Thankfully, there was no sign of Sarah. Vanessa turned to look at what Chuck was looking at. "What is it?"

"Um…nothing."

Vanessa tugged him along to get him moving again and they approached a group by the elevator. "Good news. Chuck, decided to come too."

"Hey, that's great," Simon nodded.

Michael was staring at Chuck and Vanessa's linked hands. His face looked grim. Chuck immediately yanked his hand away from Vanessa's. Her head whipped around and her gaze followed Chuck's. He heard her grunt beside him. They all piled in an elevator and headed to the lobby.

Vanessa did not try and take his hand again, but she did make the entire ten minute walk at his side. She was glaring at Michael who was in front of them. He seemed to be doing his best to ignore them. Chuck was feeling slightly uncomfortable about the whole thing. He wracked his brain for a way to tell Vanessa that he really wasn't interested. All the idea's he came up with seemed rather egotistical or rude. She hadn't done anything wrong…exactly. Chuck had told her he didn't have a girlfriend and she was really nice.

"Have you tried the sweet onion chicken teriyaki?" Vanessa asked. "It's delicious."

"Oh, yeah, my friend, Morgan loves that sandwich."

"You want to split one?" Vanessa asked.

"Oh… I think I'm going to have a BMT," Chuck replied scratching his head.

"Oh, okay."

Chuck got his sandwich first and headed over and sat with Michael, Simon and Clark. Chuck hadn't spent much time talking to Clark. Vanessa gave Chuck a curious look when she walked by, but she sat at the next table with Richard and Gerald.

Simon and Michael were talking about Derrick apparently. Chuck attempted to focus on his sandwich. "It's just weird that's all. Derrick isn't the type to just fall off the face of the Earth for a few days."

"Yeah, Tom is pretty steamed about it actually. He's going to have some serious explaining to do when he comes back to work," Michael replied.

"Maybe he scheduled vacation and just never told Tom?" Clark asked.

"He wouldn't schedule a vacation without telling me," Simon argued. "I'm his best friend. I'm telling you, something's wrong."

"Come on, Simon, what's the worst that could have happened?"

"He could have been grabbed by terrorists and forced to break some code to help in a terrorist attack?" Simon offered.

"Derrick's not that good of a code breaker," Clark snickered.

"Shut up," Simon snapped. "If he doesn't show up to work tomorrow, I'm calling the police."

"I wouldn't do that," Chuck sputtered.

"Why not?" Simon demanded.

Chuck wracked his brain, but couldn't come up with a good reason. "Maybe he's involved in a criminal enterprise and he wouldn't want the police involved?" Chuck offered.

All three occupants of the small table stared at Chuck. Chuck raised his eyebrows a shrugged. Simon, Clark and Michael all burst out laughing. "Yeah Derrick involved in organized crime." Michael slapped him on the back. "You're a funny guy, Chuck."

"So, Chuck, you going to make good and take us out for a beer on Friday?"

"Friday?"

"Well, we get paid this Friday and you agreed to take us out for some beers when you got your first pay check."

"Oh…right. Um, I'll have to check."

"With who? You have a date?" Michael asked suspiciously.

"Oh, uh…er, no."

"Then who? You live by yourself, no girlfriend, who are you going to check with?"

Simon, Clark and Michael were all staring at him waiting for an answer. "Er…nobody."

"Look, Chuck, if you don't want to hang out with us…" Simon started.

"No, it's not that!"

The three men continued looking at him in anticipation. When he didn't answer Michael asked. "Are you hiding something from us?"

"No, why?" Chuck asked. He was starting to sweat.

"You just seem like you're always hiding something," Michael shrugged. "Do you have the policy manuals finished yet?"

Chuck let out a breath. "No, I'm working on them, but I haven't finished them."

"Well get them done. With Derrick missing, we're already losing time. I'm supposed to be getting some mathematical formulas from Derrick and if doesn't get back soon. I'll have to do them myself or have Simon do them."

"No way, I've got my own projects."

"This is important, Simon."

"Oh, you always think your stuff is more important than everyone else's. Just because nobody's ever broken 1024 encryption before doesn't make you a rock star."

"I don't think I'm a rock star."

"Yes you do, all you care about is getting published in mathematics monthly."

"I'll remember you said that, when I'm your boss."

"They better not make you our boss." Clark shook his head. "I'd rather be eaten by a grue."

"If you're going to spend all your time wandering around in the dark without a flashlight, you'll likely get your wish." Michael shrugged.

"Wait a sec, you guys play Zork?" Chuck asked. "I love that game. I made a version of that in college."

"Wow." Simon's eyebrows near flew off his head. "That's really cool!"

"Can we play it?" Clark asked.

"Hmm" Chuck thought for a moment. "I'll have to see if I still have a version of it on a USB key, I had some computer problems a few years back. I lost a lot of my stuff from college."

"That sucks. What happened, did you have a power surge?"

"No it was destroyed by a ninja assassin," Chuck replied.

This caused the other three occupants of the table to burst out laughing again. Vanessa and Richard walked up to their table. "What's so funny?" Vanessa asked.

"Chuck," Simon replied.

"Oh, what's funny about Chuck?"

"A ninja assassin destroyed an original version of Zork he supposedly programmed in college," Michael answered.

Vanessa gave Chuck a skeptical look. "Uh, huh."

"It's true," Chuck assured them. For reasons not entirely clear to Chuck this caused the three people he was sitting with to burst out laughing again.

"Ninja assassins," Michael muttered shaking his head.

"Come on, Chuck, ninja computer assassins or no, it's time we all got back to the office." Vanessa tugged on Chuck's shirt and the four people at Chuck's table all got up. On the way back Michael explained that he was going to spend the afternoon helping Chuck brush up on his programming skills and teaching him about the code they were using. Chuck found himself dreading it as they slowly made their way back.

***

"So are you heading back?" Chuck asked when he and Sarah reached their home.

"No, I told Beckman I needed to talk to you."

"Good idea, you do need to get some sleep."

"Maybe, but you said you wanted to talk, so let's talk."

"Now?"

"Do you have other plans?"

"Well…I have to get the NSA policy manuals read and I'm only half done."

"What have you been doing while I've been gone?"

"I've been working on it."

Sarah shook her head. "You can have until dinner. I'm going to throw something in the oven and then work out. We'll talk at dinner."

"Okay," Chuck agreed.

"But get some reading done!" Sarah yelled after him. "No video games!"

"You sound like Ellie!" Chuck shouted back.

"I'll get you for that!"

"You're all talk!" Chuck laughed as he made his way downstairs. He'd made some progress getting his space setup. His desk was organized. They weren't getting internet access until Saturday so his computer didn't do much, but it was up and running at least.

Chuck flipped on the reading light above his desk and started working on through the NSA policy manual on gifts and benefits. It seemed like a lot of words to say that you weren't supposed to take bribes and kickbacks. He couldn't believe all the scenarios they felt it was necessary to explain. Chuck also couldn't believe that he wasn't allowed to accept a free seat upgrade while traveling on NSA business. Not that he ever expected to.

Sarah bounced down the stairs while Chuck was reading. "How's it going?" she asked.

"Just learning about all the people I can't take money or gifts from."

"Yeah… that sucks," Sarah replied. "It's no wonder I prefer the CIA."

"You take bribes and kickbacks?" Chuck asked jerking his head up from the page. His wandering eyes wandered over Sarah aggressively. She was wearing an emerald green sports bra and spandex pants with a pony tail, leaving her bare midriff unprotected from Chuck's leering gaze. Chuck finally managed to drag his eyes up to meet Sarah's her lips were curved into a smile and that's when he realized that she was only standing in front of him to make him crazy with lust.

"You look nice," Chuck offered.

"What, these old workout clothes?" Sarah asked. She looked down at her clothes as if she'd forgotten what exactly it was she was almost wearing. If she'd cut the tags off of her outfit more than five minutes ago, Chuck would have been shocked.

"Yes…it's a nice fit."

Sarah rolled her eyes. "Thanks," she replied and walked over to the corner of the basement where they'd setup her heavy bag. She wanted a treadmill and a weight machine, but they hadn't managed to acquire them yet, so for now it was just her heavy bag and a few free weights. "Don't mind me," she told him. "I'm just going to work up a little sweat before dinner."

Chuck, however, did mind Sarah. He minded her good. He watched every punch, kick and jab until he realized that he'd just been staring at her for good ten minutes. He tried to turn back to his reading, but the crisp pop, pop, pop, of her punches was too distracting. He packed up his books and headed back upstairs. "Where are you going?" Sarah called after him.

"I'm just going to go read upstairs."

"You don't have to do that…"

"It's okay, I think the additional light…it'll be uh…you know, good for my eyes."

Sarah muttered something, but Chuck didn't catch it. She kept pounding away on the heavy bag and even from upstairs he could hear the steady rhythm as she worked. The pounding eventually stopped and Chuck refocused on the complications surrounding accepting gifts from foreign family members.

Chuck was quickly interrupted by the oven timer going off. "I got it!" he heard Sarah yell from the basement. Seconds later she was upstairs in a whirl of shiny sweat and spandex. Chuck could hear her thumping around in the kitchen. She wandered past him a few moments later and said. "I'm going to go take a quick shower and then we'll have dinner." He watched her walk toward the bedroom her skin glistening… Chuck tried to shake the image of Sarah in the shower, but it just wouldn't go away. He finally threw his book down and set the table.

_Who can concentrate with these kinds of distractions?_ Chuck mused. Sarah came out dressed in jeans and blue top a few minutes later. "Three wardrobe changes in one day, you must do a lot of laundry?"

"I thought the laundry was your job?" Sarah replied.

"My job…"

Sarah grinned at him. "We'll have to work out the division of chores. You do have to do some stuff too. I'm not your maid."

"I didn't…" Chuck sputtered. "I told you, I don't expect you to cook and clean for me."

Sarah poked him in the shoulder. "Well too bad, because we're sharing the chores. Maybe this weekend we can sit down and break out the jobs."

"This sounds like a lot of work…"

"You used to do them when you lived by yourself."

"Yeah, but only when I wanted to..."

Sarah shook her head. "I suppose it's too much to ask that you do a little work because you enjoy living with me?"

"I do?"

Sarah arched her eyebrows. "You don't enjoy living with me?"

"Well, I mean it's only been a few days…I've hardly seen you the last two," Chuck explained.

"I enjoy living with you…" Sarah replied flatly.

"How can you know that already?" Chuck asked. "You've hardly spent any time here at all."

"I enjoy getting to see you every day. I enjoy getting to touch you whenever I want. I enjoy making dinner for you. I enjoy watching you read your NSA policy manuals. I really enjoy snuggling in the mornings before we get up…" Sarah trailed off.

"That's really all you need?" Chuck asked.

"No, but just because we haven't figured out exactly being a couple yet, doesn't mean I don't enjoy the parts we have figured out. I guess that's the difference between you and I. I always enjoyed our cover relationship. I cherished the time I got to spend with you, even if we couldn't be open about how we felt. _You_ always thought it was torture."

"It wasn't _torture. _I just really wanted what we had to be real. I guess in my head I couldn't deal with the fact that you might feel nothing for me and it could all be an act. If it was all an act…it would have destroyed me."

"Well," Sarah shrugged. "part of it was an act. We couldn't be together, it wasn't allowed. I had feelings for you, but I couldn't act on them in a real way. Now here we are, this is all real. I'm here, you're here…Why aren't you enjoying it now." Chuck poked at his meatloaf instead of answering. "Oh, my, God," Sarah muttered, "you still don't think this is real!"

Chuck kept his eyes on his plate. "It's not that I don't think it's real." Chuck paused. "I'm just concerned that this is born out of your obligation to me, which was born out of an obligation to your country. I know how hard you're trying…"

"What do you want me to say?" Sarah demanded. "What can I do to prove to you, that I'm here because I want to be here?"

"Take the job."

"I don't want the damn job!" Sarah shouted.

"You'd take the job if I wasn't here."

"I would have a totally different job if you weren't here, but that isn't the frigging point. YOU ARE HERE! I want to be here. I like it here! Stop trying to push me away!"

Chuck and Sarah eyed each other uneasily over the rest of dinner. After dinner Chuck put the dishes in the dishwasher and started to head downstairs.

"Where are you going?" Sarah demanded.

"I was going to go work on the NSA policy manuals."

"We aren't done."

"We're not?"

"No, not until we finish this argument."

"There's more?"

Sarah gave him a very sour look. "We are going to fix this. We are going to come to a conclusion _together. _Then we are going to make up and then we are going to spend some time together, because I haven't seen you all week and I'm not going to spend the only night I've gotten with you this week fighting. I'm not." Sarah pointed to the couch. "Now sit down."

Chuck sat down on the couch and Sarah promptly sat across his lap.

"What are you doing?"

"I'm sitting in your lap." She began running her fingers through his hair.

"Why?"

"Because you're much less argumentative when you're distracted. Haven't you ever noticed that I end up kissing you when we're fighting?"

"So this is a tactic?" Sarah looked at him with big doey eyes and nodded. "Unbelievable," Chuck muttered.

"Is that a problem?" Sarah asked as she kept running her fingers through his hair. Chuck tried to pull his head away, but Sarah just waited until he stopped moving and then scooted closer.

"Did the CIA teach you this?" Chuck asked.

"No, my Dad did."

"So, this is a con trick?" Chuck asked indignantly.

"Shhh," Sarah admonished and proceeded to nestle against him and run her fingers over his chest. "I don't want to fight anymore," Sarah replied softly.

"But you're manipulating me!"

"Is it really _terrible_?" Sarah asked.

"No, I just have this vision that for the next forty years every time we have an argument you're just going to rip your shirt off and while I'm staring at your chest you'll declare yourself the winner."

Sarah smiled widely at him. "Don't be ridiculous, Chuck. In forty years I'll be in my seventies. I'll have to find much more creative ways to win arguments. I like that you think we'll still be arguing then though. If you want to try that method now, I'm game."

"No," Chuck shook his head. "That won't be necessary." He grabbed the hem of Sarah shirt just to make sure she couldn't make good on that plan. "I really think you should take the job. I'll make you a deal. You help them out in the evenings and on weekends sometimes and I'll believe you when you tell me this is real."

Sarah frowned at him. "Why do I have to work two jobs to get you to believe me?" She tilted her head as she looked down at him.

"You liked being an agent, right?" Chuck asked.

"Yes."

"You liked making a difference. You enjoyed serving your country?"

Sarah looked at him suspiciously. "Yes."

"This is a way for you not to give that up…for you to have…I don't know, both I guess." Sarah's frown deepened. "But what about you? You need me."

"Come on, who's going to try and get me here? We live on a controlled compound and even if they get in, we have the safe room."

"Chuck, what if something happens?"

"I'll use the safe room. I promise."

"But I'll never get to see you. I'll be working all night and you'll be working all day."

"You can see me from your office at the NSA building."

Sarah stuck out a pouty lip. "It's not the same."

"You're still coming home to me at night aren't you?"

Sarah rested her head on Chuck's shoulder. "It won't be the same, we won't have dinner together. We won't get to hang out. I'll barely get to talk to you."

"It's not like it's forever, it's just one investigation."

"But Beckman wants you to start rotating around departments…tomorrow, actually."

Chuck rolled his eyes. "Great, we both get to have two jobs."

"Hey," Sarah poked him. "Duty, service…Were you just paying me lip service?"

"Isn't that what you had in mind?" Chuck kissed Sarah on the nose.

Sarah pulled her head up and looked at him with narrowed eyes. "Now who's being manipulative?"

"Well if you're going to fight dirty, then shouldn't I be able to as well?" Chuck punctuated his comment by kissing Sarah on the neck. He felt Sarah's pulse quicken. In a move that could only be completed by a spy or a gymnast she twisted in his lap and somehow was immediately straddling his legs. She released a flood gate of emotion on him as she peppered him with hungry desperate kisses.

Her iron tight grip on his hair as she kissed him was slightly uncomfortable, but it was so hard to care. Sarah had buried her face in his neck as she ground against him and one question filled Chuck's mind. "What happened to your shirt?" Chuck asked.


	15. Chapter 15 A Night Out

_**Disclaimer:**__ Clearly, I do not own Chuck. If I owned Chuck we wouldn't have to wait until March for new episodes. Well maybe we would. I haven't been getting much writing done lately, so you'd probably have to go weeks at a time without new episodes of Chuck. Then BAM! one would suddenly show up with no rhyme or reason and you'd be like, why doesn't NBC do a better job of promoting this? Why is it so long between episodes? This is really frustrating! Yep that's what it would be like if I owned Chuck. Good thing I don't own Chuck. _

_A/N There is a companion piece to this called Sarah vs. Real Life that is available at my profile. It contains scenes that Chuck isn't involved in as she navigates her way through this experience. I'm not how many updates it will have it's just the one scene right now, but I'm hoping it will help people better understand our frustrating couple._

Chapter 15 A Night Out

Chuck was staring out the window daydreaming about two nights previous. It had been so amazing. He hadn't just been with someone like that since…well since Jill. Sarah had wanted to go into the bedroom and Chuck really did too. Although now removed from the heat of the moment, he thought it was probably better that he'd had to finish going over the NSA policy manuals. If ever there was a punishment for not doing your homework. However, it would be nice if they could go out on a few dates like a normal couple, before jumping right to the sex part. Then again, Morgan and Anna had jumped right to the sex part. Chuck let his thoughts backtrack for a moment, was he really thinking that Morgan and Anna were a normal couple?

Sarah had been surprisingly calm after Chuck's revelation that she needed to put her shirt back on, so that he could finish studying the manuals. "You'd rather study those, than me?" she'd asked flirtatiously.

The answer was of course a steadfast and hardy, "No chance of that! I just don't want to get fired my first week." Sarah had sighed and agreed. Then she'd forced him to sit where she could watch him. It was a little distracting to exchange smiles with her every few minutes, but it had done his heart more good than anything he could think of over the last twenty years. Chuck loved to watch Sarah smile.

"Is something funny?" Chuck glanced at the little man across the table and realized he hadn't been paying attention to a word the man had said for about fifteen minutes.

"Oh, uh, no," Chuck shook his head. "Please continue."

Chuck watched the man across the table from him trying to explain exactly what he did. He'd been talking almost constantly for forty five minutes now. Milton Haverstein apparently provided quantitative analysis of phone calls to identify behavior patterns of people who might be threats to the United States or something. Chuck couldn't be sure, he hadn't listened to more than a handful of minutes of Milton's rambling. Allegedly, he was trying to figure out how to make Milton's workflow more streamlined. Milton was supposed to explain what he did, in great detail so Chuck could identify possible efficiencies that could be gained by merging Milton's work with the work of other departments in the NSA.

Chuck wanted to take a running start at the window and see if he could crash through it and plummet to the asphalt below. Two days of listening to Milton and his peers was enough to drive Chuck insane. At least he'd had a few stolen moments with Sarah to daydream about. He'd barely seen her the last twenty four hours. After she'd told Beckman her conditions for running the investigation, she'd only been home to drive Chuck back and forth to work. Chuck glanced at his watch. It was three fifteen on Friday. Could Milton really talk for another ninety minutes without taking a breath?

The problem with General Beckman's plan for Chuck had become apparent rather quickly. Having an efficiency expert wandering around the building holding private meetings with people in order to optimize employee integration between departments, made people nervous. It sounded an awful lot like someone who was there to determine which employees weren't needed at all. Chuck could only imagine what was going to happen when he found his next Fulcrum mole and yet another employee disappeared from the ranks.

Milton Haverstein was no Fulcrum mole, but Chuck was quickly becoming of the opinion that he should figure out getting Milton into Fulcrum's ranks. He could easily bore them all to death.

"That's great, Milton," Chuck finally cut him off at ten minutes to four. "I think I know everything I need to know about Quantitative Behavior Pattern Matching."

Milton's eyes grew very large. "But how can you possibly? I haven't even explained derivative data mining using Kipplinger's formula through triple sampled subject studies!"

"Yeah… Well actually, I'm quite familiar with Kipplinger's formula, so I think I'm good," Chuck explained.

"Really?" Milton said in awe. "Have you read Dubenhorf's latest paper on subjective blind sampling?"

"Yeah, I looked it over," Chuck lied.

"That's amazing, I didn't think the NSA had anybody else following Dubenhorf's studies. What did you think of his conclusion?"

"Um… look, Milton, I'd really love to sit here and discuss Dubenhorf's findings with you. I really would, but I interviewed five people today and I have write up reports on all of you. You wouldn't want me to short change you in your report because I didn't have time to write it would you?"

Milton's mouth dropped open. "Heavens no!"

"I knew you'd understand."

"It was really nice meeting you, Mr. Carmichael," Milton said as he practically bolted from the conference room. Chuck pressed his palms to his eyes as the door swung shut.

"I wish I could say the same, Milton," he muttered.

Chuck picked up his notepad and marched slowly back to his desk. Upon reaching his cubical, he put his head down on the cool Formica desktop. He had forty one minutes before he could go home.

"Carmichael!" Chuck jumped as his name was barked.

"What's up, Michael?" Chuck asked without feeling.

"I sent you a code fragment yesterday. I needed you to review it. Have you had a chance to go through it yet?"

"No."

"You had all day yesterday and today!" Michael replied angrily.

"I was working on a special project for another department."

"What kind of project?"

"I was reviewing work flow efficiency and information integration between departments."

"Chuck, I need your attention on this project," Michael said hotly, while dropping a packet of papers on Chuck's desk. "This is important. The security of the entire nation could be at stake. What could be more important?"

Chuck heard Van snickering across his cubicle wall. "Doesn't what everybody does here at the _National Security Agency_ have something to do with protecting the _nation's_ security?" Chuck reasoned.

"Don't be smart," Michael glared at him. "You were assigned to help me with this project. I'm going to expect better results next week." Michael spun and walked away.

"Gaaawd," Van said as her head popped above the cubicle. "He can be such an ass sometimes. Don't pay any attention to him, he always thinks whatever he's working on is the most important thing in the whole agency."

"Well he has a point. I am supposed to be working on his stuff, but now I've got this other project."

"Sounds like someone's going to be working from home," Van replied in a singsong voice.

"Yeah, great…" Chuck muttered.

"Are you coming out with us tonight?" Van asked.

"I…" Chuck hesitated. He'd promised them he'd go out and buy the guys, Van included, a beer tonight. Sarah had even gotten a night away from her investigation to do it. However, now that Sarah had a night off, Chuck didn't really want to spend it bonding with his coworkers. "I'm not sure if I'm going to make it."

"Why not?" Van asked.

"I've got some other things going on." Chuck shrugged. "You know how it is."

Van eyed him suspiciously. "What kinds of other things?" Van asked.

"Van, don't be so nosey," Steve interjected.

"I'm being friendly," Van replied defensively.

"You should come out with us," Steve prodded. "Unless of course you have a hot date."

Chuck laughed uncomfortably. "No, it's just a friend."

Van eyed Chuck suspiciously. "What kind of a friend?"

"You know, a friend…"

"Would this friend be of the female persuasion?" Van asked.

"Vanessa! Quit grilling him," Steve barked.

"Well I wouldn't have to grill him, if he wasn't Mr. Mysterious all the time," Van frowned.

"You should invite your friend along," Steve offered. "It's really casual. We've been getting together almost every Friday for a while now. Well those of us that are single anyway."

"If you don't come, it's going to be a total drag." Van shook her head.

"Why?" Chuck asked.

"Well, Simon is all worried about Derrick. It's all he ever talks about anymore. Richard is kind of bugged out too. Michael's in one of his _moods_. Tim will be completely blitzed by six PM. Steve over there will go home early."

"Hey," Steve objected.

"Oh, come on, you _always_ go home early. Roger only ever talks about work." Van shook her head. "Derrick and Simon are always the fun ones, but Derrick's probably not coming, since he skipped work all week."

"I think Simon's going over to Derrick's after work. So he might make it."

"He's been over there the last two nights, but there's no sign of him," Van replied dismissively. "He's pulled some sort of disappearing act."

"Are you and Derrick close?" Chuck asked.

Van nodded. "We've been friends for a long time. Simon, Derrick and I worked together before we came to the NSA. He got me my job here actually. It's not like this is totally out of character though. Derrick's always been secretive, especially about women. He's a lot like you actually."

"What?" Chuck sputtered.

"Cute, funny, intelligent, and mysterious and he was always a bit clueless about women too, although not quite as much as you are." Van winked at him.

Steve cleared his throat and disappeared back behind his cubicle wall. "I'm not mysterious," Chuck replied in his own defense.

"Oh, come on, you've sat next to me for a week and you haven't told me one significant thing about yourself."

"What do you want to know?" Chuck asked.

Van rolled her eyes at him. "Sure, now you want to talk. Look, if you want I can help you with the stuff for Michael. I mean, I work on telecommunications stuff, but I'm a pretty fair coder…"

"That's okay," Chuck waved her off.

"You're never going to get up to speed if you're working outside the department all day and you're working by yourself at home."

"I'll get by."

"Don't be dumb, Chuck. Recognize a good opportunity when it smacks you in the face."

Chuck hesitated. "That's really nice of you, but I'm not sure how to make that work."

Van grunted in frustration. "All right then, but you better show tonight, or else we're all going to think you don't like us."

Chuck sighed. "I'll be there," he grumbled.

***

"You know I'd rather just spend the evening with you, don't you?" Chuck asked.

Sarah gave him an appraising look. "You better."

"It's just, well they're my coworkers and we don't know each other very well yet and I'm trying…"

"I get it," Sarah replied shortly.

"Seriously, I just…"

"Chuck," Sarah reached over and put her hand on his leg. "it's okay. I understand your need to be friends with your coworkers. I watched you at the Buy More for years. I'd be disappointed in you, if you weren't friendly with them. I just…well, after the other night…"

"I know," Chuck nodded. "me too."

Sarah moved her hand to pick his up and clasped it. "Good, I'm glad. It's the only thing that makes working two jobs worth it. Knowing you'll be there when I get home." She gave him a sad smile and squeezed his hand before letting go to downshift. They pulled into the parking lot of the small pub. "You'll be smart tonight won't you?"

"I can hardly help it can, I? I mean I am a genius after all." Chuck gave her a little of the Bartowski eyebrow dance. His heart raced as Sarah reached over towards him slowly. He started leaning towards her when pain shot through his ear as Sarah flicked it.

"Don't be an arrogant, jerk," Sarah admonished him.

Chuck rubbed his ear. "I was only kidding."

"I know, I flicked your ear because you're joking about your safety. It's not a joke. I don't joke about it, it's not funny."

Chuck frowned. "You didn't used to get this upset when I made jokes."

"That's because our relationship was a cover and I didn't have any girlfriend privileges. Now, if you're smart with me, I'll smack you." Sarah threatened.

"Didn't you just tell me to be smart, like two minutes ago, now I'm not supposed to be smart, it's so hard to keep track." Sarah just raised one eyebrow threateningly. "You know, if you hit me now, its domestic violence!"

Sarah rolled her eyes and shook her head. She did a quick scan of the parking lot and then turned back to him. "Come here," she pulled on the collar of his shirt until he slid forward and she kissed him softly. "Be smart about what you say, be aware of your surroundings and don't watch me, but know where I am, all right?" Chuck swallowed harshly and nodded. Sarah pressed another kiss to him this time her tongue intertwined with his briefly as her hand slid down to his chest.

After a moment she pulled back and smiled at him. She rubbed her lipstick off of him. "You'd better go," she whispered. "Before I drive us both home." Chuck leaned forward and kissed her once briefly. He let his finger trail down her cheek. Her face was happy, but her eyes were sad. It was an interesting juxtaposition, it was a puzzle Chuck resolved to one day solve.

"We'll be home before you know it."

***

Chuck stepped into Chubby's Pub and scanned the crowd. It wasn't exactly hard to spot the group of NSA employees. They'd commandeered two tables over by a couple of ancient video games. Tim was playing Spy Hunter while Michael looked over his shoulder. Simon, Steve, Richard and Clark were sitting at one of the tables. It appeared there was a furious card game going on at the table, as he approached he could see that they were playing Magic the Gathering.

"I didn't know anyone still played that," Chuck said as he walked up to the table.

"Oh, hey, Chuck," Steve greeted him. It was followed by a welcome from the other members of the table. Chuck grabbed a chair and watched as the four waged war on one another.

"We don't play this much anymore. We just thought it would be fun. You can get in on the next game I have a spare deck," Clark offered.

"Why do I get the feeling your backup deck wouldn't exactly lead me to victory?" Chuck asked.

"Because _you _are highly intelligent," Steve supplied.

Chuck watched as Richard marched towards victory. He spotted Sarah walking in and taking a seat at the bar. He was used to seeing her in disguise, but it still surprised him how quickly she could change her looks. Pudgy dark haired college student was a stretch for her, but she was pulling it off. She attracted little attention as she took up her post to watch him. Chuck knew he wasn't supposed to watch her, so he turned away from the bar.

He was surprised when he felt some sidle up next to him. "Hi guys," said a familiar voice.

"Hey, Van!" the group at the table called back without looking up.

"Hello," Chuck greeted her. He glanced down at her and his eyes widened in surprise. Van was always cuteish in her way. She had long brown hair that Chuck had mostly only seen tied back. Seeing her fully done up in a dress was quite a different view. "Wow," Chuck finally added. "You look great."

Her eyes had been searching his face and her smile grew slightly at the compliment. "Thanks, I'm glad you like it."

Chuck shrugged. "It's the truth, I'm sure they'd all agree." Chuck waved at the table.

"You look great, Van," Simon replied without looking up.

"Stunning as usual," Richard agreed flatly.

"You take my breath away," Clark added in a flat monotone. Van smacked him gently in the back of the head. "Well it's nice that there's one of you that still bothers to compliment me.

Clark rubbed the back of his head and then shook out his long hair. "Easy, Van, it's just a joke. Clark turned around briefly and looked Van up and down. "You look great. You always look great. Now, how do I look?" Clark waved a hand past his Metallica t-shirt and faded jeans.

"Like a slob, Clark," Van replied.

"Hey! I pulled it off!" Clark gave Richard a high five and turned back to the game.

Van huffed slightly. "They could have girlfriends if, you know, they actually tried a little," Van whispered conspiratorially towards Chuck.

"Oh, and what's your excuse?" Chuck asked.

Van shrugged. "I like nerds. I'm just looking for the right one." Van swayed her hips slightly so her shoulder bumped Chuck's.

"Heh heh," Chuck laughed nervously.

"Has Chuck bought everyone a round yet?" Van asked.

"Not yet," Richard shook his head.

"Come on, Chuck, I'm thirsty, come buy me a drink."

Van ordered a cosmopolitan and Chuck ended up with a vodka lemonade. He very rarely drank. He'd been to a few drinking parties in college and he'd had spiked punch at a few of Ellie and Devon's parties, but in the last three years, he'd rarely had more than a sip or two of alcohol.

As the evening went on, the quiet pub grew noisier and louder, but Chuck found himself having a good time with his coworkers. For the most part, they all had similar backgrounds. Except for Clark who had originally been a high school dropout, they'd all been at the top of their classes. And discounting Van and Clark, they'd attended an impressive array of the most respected higher learning institutions in the country.

Van was the puzzle of the group. She was the only woman, didn't have the impressive education most of the group had and didn't seem quite as nerdy as the rest of the group. However, as the evening progressed it was clear that all of them deferred to her in some fashion or another. She seemed to be the social glue that helped hold the group together.

When the teasing became too intense, it was Van who would quietly put a stop to it. If someone had been quiet for a long time, Van would draw them out again. Chuck had spent a good part of the evening trying to put some space between Van and himself. It hadn't worked particularly well; he always seemed to end up sitting next to her. The result of that was that Chuck spent a good share of the evening chatting with her and learning all about her. She'd grown up outside of Harrisburg Pennsylvania, but her Dad had taken a job in Memphis Tennessee when she was sixteen.

She'd not adjusted well to living in the South and as soon as she graduated she'd attempted escape. Her parents still lived in Memphis and she returned to visit them as infrequently as possible. Chuck was perfectly happy to let Van talk about herself but after half a dozen drinks he was ill prepared when the microscope turned back on him.

"So what did you do in Los Angelesssss?" Van slurred.

"I worked at the Buy More."

Van gave him a very squinty look. It was hard to tell if she was confused or just thinking. "At the electronics chain?"

"Yep." Chuck nodded.

"Why?"

Chuck shrugged. "Gotta work somewhere."

"But you went to Stamfer…Standfer…Standford," Van finally told him.

"Yep."

"That doesn't make sensssse," Van slurred.

Chuck shrugged again. "It was just a job."

"How come I have to get you drunk to get you to talk about yourssssself?"

"I'm not drunk," Chuck replied indignantly.

"If'n I'm drunk, you're drunk'n I'm definitely drunk."

"I'm taller than you," Chuck pointed out.

"That'ssss true," Van acknowledged. "And you have a cute facccce."

"You have a cute face too," Chuck replied.

"Awwwe, thank you." Van beamed a lopsided smile at him. "I was afraid maybe you didn't like it."

"It's nice," Chuck nodded. "Very pink."

"I'm…not…I'm not pink," Van objected.

"I have to use the restroom," Chuck replied. Chuck had some small issues balancing as he stood up. He took a quick moment to steady himself.

Chuck walked unsteadily to the men's restroom and managed to relieve himself. He even washed his hands, but as he was coming out of the bathroom someone shoved him against the wall of the hallway. "Chuck, you said we were only coming for a little while, why are we still here?"

"Sarah?" Chuck asked. "You look funny."

"Great," Sarah muttered. "I knew you were drunk. I have to meet my FBI team at eight AM, Chuck."

Chuck checked his watch. "You've got plenty of time. I think you can make it."

Sarah growled. "I'd like to go home and get some sleep. Go say good night to your friends and then come outside."

"But we're having fun, you should come with me," Chuck offered.

"You know I can't." Sarah grunted.

"Oh, right, the cover!" Chuck exclaimed.

"Shh!" Sarah shushed him harshly. "Chuck be quiet," she whispered. "Meet me outside in five minutes."

Sarah turned and walked out of the hallway. Chuck walked back to his coworkers in what he assumed was a straight line. "I have to go," he told them. There were actually only four of them left. Everyone had gone home except for Simon, Richard, Vanessa and Chuck.

"You're leaving?" Van pouted.

"I have to go," Chuck repeated.

"Why?" Van asked.

"Um," Chuck tried to think hard. "I'm tired."

"Oh," Van pouted. "How are you getting home? You ssshouldn't drive."

"Chuck, doesn't have a car," Simon pointed out.

"Oh, that's right." Van nodded. "You ssshouldn't drive, because you don't have a car."

"I'm going, see you guys on Monday."

"Bye, Chuck!" Van said loudly. "Thankssss for coming!"

"Van, you are so drunk," Simon muttered as Chuck walked away. "See you, Chuck," he called after Chuck. Richard also called out a quick goodbye.

Chuck stumbled outside and spotted Sarah sitting in the car, its engine already running. "Hi honey," Chuck giggled as he slipped into the passenger seat.

"I can't believe you got drunk and stayed here all night," Sarah muttered back.

"I didn't mean to." Chuck shook his head violently. "I forgot."

"You forgot not to get drunk?"

"Uh…yep!"

Sarah huffed and burned a little rubber as she launched her Porsche out of the parking lot.

"So why was Vanessa hanging all over you?" Sarah asked harshly.

"You know Vanessa?" Chuck asked.

Sarah rolled her eyes. "I read dossiers on all of your coworkers before you were allowed to start working in that department. What's her deal?"

"She likes me." Chuck snickered.

"Yeah, I got that. But why did you spend all night with her?"

"She followed me!" Chuck objected.

"You didn't seem to put up much of a fight," Sarah grumbled. "Do you like her?"

"She's nice." Chuck nodded. Sarah grunted and gunned the car forward picking up speed. "She's not as pretty as you though," Chuck added. That brought a slight smile to Sarah's face and she let off the accelerator just a bit. "You're more yelly. Whoah," Chuck said as his head slammed into the headrest. Sarah pushed the car as fast as it would go through the Maryland countryside. With just the headlights to track by, Chuck was having trouble with how quickly the scenery was flipping by. "I don't feel good," Chuck said warningly.

"Chuck, if you get sick in my car. I will kill you," Sarah replied testily.

"I think you better let me walk the rest of the way then…"

"Chuck!" Sarah yelled. She slammed on the brakes, but it was too late as the last few drinks and pretzels Chuck had eaten at the bar came tumbling back up just as he lurched towards the dashboard from the hard stop. Chuck watched in fascination as his vomit came out horizontally landing on the dashboard and coating the windshield.

"Oops?" Chuck offered, just before he passed out.

_A/N: So, I have really great fans. No seriously, I do! It's a very odd thing to refer to people as your fans. I just want all of you who are reading this, both the fans and the ones that hate me to know I appreciate you. That's right, I appreciate people who hate me. Well, not as much as the people who like me, but you know… Hey, you hate me, what do you care? So, yeah, thanks to all the readers out there. _

_Now, breaking with tradition I want to send a shout out to Joel, who checks these chapters over for typos and other acts of negligence. Yes, the chapters still aren't perfect, but you do appreciate Joel's work, even if you don't realize it. ___


	16. Chapter 16 Pieces of Her

_**Disclaimer:**__I don't own Chuck and the people who do suck. Yeah I said it, go ahead and sue me fancy pants!_

_A/N: When I last left you Chuck had gone out for a few too many drinks with his new coworkers at the NSA. There was an unfortunate incident on the ride home…_

**Chapter 16: Pieces of Her**

Chuck groaned. What the hell had happened to him? Had he been captured by Fulcrum? Opening his eyes was definitely a mistake as sharp daggers of light stabbed at his eyes.

Chuck moaned.

It came back to him slowly like a slow motion horror film. He'd gone to the bar and spent the evening mostly talking to Vanessa. "Oh," Chuck groaned. She'd kept ordering them drink after drink. Eventually, Sarah had tracked him down and made him come home. "Oh, crap," Chuck muttered. "I puked in her car."

_Wait. That doesn't make sense. _"How am I still alive?"

Chuck started doing a cursory check of his body parts to make sure he still had all of them, when to his horror he realized—"I'm naked!" Chuck sat up quickly, another horrible mistake that he quickly rectified by laying back down again. He was naked and he appeared to be clean. Surely Sarah hadn't stripped him naked and sponged him off. That definitely didn't happen. Unfortunately, he couldn't think of any other explanation as to how he'd ended up on the couch both naked and clean. He turned towards the television and on the coffee table there was a note with two pills sitting on top of it, next to a glass of water

Chuck reached for the note.

_Take these, drink all of the water. I'll be home later._

He did as the note demanded and then lay back down. Chuck wondered idly if it was too early in the day for a nap. He squinted at the clock in the dining room. One thirty in the afternoon. It definitely wasn't too early. Chuck put his head down and went back to sleep.

* * *

Chuck woke up a little after four his headache considerably dulled. His tongue felt decidedly fuzzy. He dragged himself into the shower and let the lukewarm water cascade over him until he felt mildly less sick. How many drinks had he consumed the night before? He couldn't remember and thinking about it hurt—a sure sign that it was way too many. Chuck couldn't believe he'd vomited in Sarah's Porsche, but even more unbelievable was the fact that he was alive after doing so. She loved that car. Certainly she loved that car more than she loved him…didn't she? She told him she loved that car several times and she'd never used those three words on him. Chuck groaned and turned off the water. How exactly did one make up for ruining a Porsche? It's not like he could buy her a new one.

Chuck got dressed and stumbled into the kitchen. He contemplated food, but just looking at the refrigerator made him feel sick. Chuck settled for a nice tall glass of water and then went downstairs and turned on his computer. He logged on to the NSA network and tried to concentrate on the code Michael had asked him to review. In his current state he was having trouble even understanding it, let alone optimizing it.

He'd been at it for several hours when he heard the front door open and close. Inevitably the footsteps came on the floor above. Suddenly the dread of facing Sarah seeped in at all angles.

"Chuck?" He heard Sarah call down the stairs. He couldn't bring himself to answer. The last thing he wanted was to see the look on her face when she saw him.

Chuck heard her walk to the back of the house. He heard her swear and then she came running down the stairs. Chuck swallowed harshly and stared at the bottom of the stair case. Sarah came rushing down the last step, but froze as her foot hit the basement floor.

"Chuck?" she asked.

"Hi," Chuck replied sheepishly. Sarah's eyes didn't suddenly explode with daggers and kill him instantly, so Chuck thought that was probably positive.

"Are you all right?" Sarah asked.

"Um…"

Sarah took a step towards him and Chuck wheeled his office chair back slightly, but he didn't have far to retreat. "What's wrong?" Sarah demanded.

"I'm really sorry," Chuck finally sputtered. "I don't know what happened last night, I just got to talking to my coworkers and I guess I had more drinks that I thought and I lost track of time and please don't kill me, I'm really sorry," he rambled.

Sarah held up her hand to stop him. "It's okay."

Chuck's ears perked. "It's okay? You aren't going to kill me?"

Sarah shook her head. "No." She took a step towards Chuck and he cringed backwards.

"Is this some sort of spy trick, where you tell me you aren't going to kill me and then you just kill me anyway?"

Sarah looked a little exasperated. "Chuck, I'm not going to kill you. You did scare me when you didn't answer me." She hesitated. "You thought I was going to hurt you?"

The realization caused Sarah's face to distort into a mixture of displeasure and disappointment and Chuck felt like even more of a heel.

"Look, Chuck, I was mad, I'm still a little disappointed about last night and I _really_ wish you hadn't thrown up in my car. You have no idea how much I wish you hadn't done _that_, but I'd never hurt you." She finally closed the distance between them and ran a hand over his forehead. "You're clammy."

"Sorry, I do that when I'm freaking out."

"I cleaned you up last night before I put you on the couch and you thought after going through all that I'd wait until today? If I was going to kill you, I'd have definitely done it last night." Chuck gulped. It wasn't a very pleasant thought. "But I wouldn't," Sarah amended. "We do need to talk about it though."

"I don't…Sarah…I would _never_ intentionally vomit in your car… I haven't been drunk in a really long time and I guess I didn't realize how much I'd had. You have to believe me!" Chuck pleaded.

"Not about that, about us, about what you really want from this." The intense look in Sarah's eyes scared him just a bit. "Do you want to go out to dinner? It's still early, how about a date?"

"Sure."

Sarah played with his hair briefly, but made no other affectionate gestures towards him. "Be ready to go at six?" she asked.

"Definitely," Chuck nodded.

* * *

Chuck was ready to go well before Sarah. He was sitting in the living room waiting for her to finish. When she finally stepped out of the bedroom Chuck's breath was sucked right out him. Sarah was dressed in an emerald green dress that had a flowing skirt and a tight bodice. She looked amazing but Chuck supposed he shouldn't be surprised by that anymore.

"All that just for me?" Chuck asked.

Sarah nodded, looking just the slightest bit smug "Just for you."

"You look…" Chuck searched for the word, but words seemed to fail him. In the end he could only settle for something a fraction of how he felt. "…amazing. _Really_ amazing."

"Thanks, I'd hoped you might like it." Chuck stood up and Sarah adjusted his collar. "You should really wear ties."

"Why?" Chuck asked.

"It gives me something to fiddle with." Sarah gave him a sly smile.

"So you fix my tie…"

"Because I like touching you." She said it so matter-of-factly even though he'd never heard her express herself in such a way in the three years they were together. "

Sarah ignored his surprised expression and continued. "It always gave me a reason when we went out on missions, or just at the Buy More. Did you not figure that out? It drove Casey nuts."

Chuck smiled. "I guess I just had a hard time imagining that you needed to think up reasons to touch me."

"Well it had to be within the realm of professional contact. I always thought they were some of the more intimate moments we were ever allowed to have." Chuck gulped. He didn't know what to say to that, but was saved a response when Sarah asked. "Shall we go?"

Chuck followed Sarah out to the driveway, but when he got there he stopped short. "What's this?" Chuck asked.

"A 2005 Ford Crown Victoria," Sarah replied. She opened the driver's door and turned to face Chuck.

"Um…okay…why?"

"Well someone decided to ruin my last car so it's at the dealership. They're taking it apart to …er…clean it. I needed some temporary wheels and I work with the FBI, so…" Sarah looked down the car. "The Washington motor pool generally caters to 55 year old senior staffers who want a large American made car. Plus I don't exactly have the pull in the department I used to have." Sarah patted the top of the car. "I had my choice of six different Crown Vics or a Ford Taurus. I picked this one." Sarah gave Chuck a challenging look daring him to say anything else about the car.

"Wow, if Casey could see us know," Chuck quipped. He wandered the considerable distance around the back of the car and got in the passenger side. "I'm really sorry about the Porsche."

"Me too, I loved that car." Sarah turned the key and the Detroit steel flooded to life.

"I knew you were mad about that."

Sarah sighed. "It's just a car. Plus we need something a little more…inconspicuous."

"You're selling it?" Chuck asked in outrage. She couldn't be serious.

Sarah winced. "Well… I mean… I thought maybe we should buy a car together. Something for both of us…" Sarah pulled the incredible hulk of metal out onto the road. She hit the accelerator and the car lurched forward awkwardly.

This wasn't going to work at all. "I'm really sorry." Chuck apologized again.

Sarah reached across the very wide console and grasped his hand. "We'll buy one together. It'll be fun."

_Visiting a car dealership? _"Sure, whatever you want," Chuck offered.

For some reason that caused Sarah to frown.

* * *

Chuck had been expecting a dinner at a fancy restaurant, so he was surprised when Sarah pulled into a Taqueria just outside of DC. There were people seated at a few tables, but the restaurant was very quiet for a Saturday night. It was not at all the kind of place that Chuck expected. Mariachi music was blaring out of the speakers by the door, but Sarah pulled Chuck to booth in the back that was much quieter.

"Ms. Sarah, you have returned!" exclaimed a diminutive Hispanic man.

Sarah smiled demurely. "Hello, Antonio."

"And you have brought a friend!" he exclaimed. "You break my heart, seniorita, I thought you and I were destined to be together."

"Oh, come now, it's been what, four years since I've stepped foot in here? I hope you haven't been waiting just for me?" Sarah replied playfully.

"I am a very patient man, Ms. Sarah. For you I would wait until oblivion." Antonio turned towards Chuck. "It's very nice to see Ms. Sarah with a gentleman. She always seems to eat alone."

"Oh, uh, thanks," Chuck replied. He was glancing between Sarah and Antonio trying to decide just how well they knew each other.

"How's business?" Sarah asked.

"Oh, you know," Antonio replied. "It's not like it was in the old days. They opened a Delgado's family restaurant down the street, business has suffered. We still have regular customer traffic, but it's been hard getting new business. I thought maybe you had changed to Delgado's too."

"Antonio," Sarah shook her head. "How could you think so little of me?"

Antonio's smile broke into an even wider grin. "The heart longs for you Ms. Sarah, don't make me wait so long before your next visit, eh?" Antonio handed them menus. "I'll bring you some fresh tortilla chips, yes?"

Sarah smiled and nodded. The little man scurried away and she turned her face back to Chuck, her smile fading as she took in his expression. "What?" she asked.

"I've just…what was that?" Chuck asked.

"Nothing." Sarah shrugged. "Antonio likes to flirt with all the girls. I used to come here a lot when I was in DC. My old apartment is like six blocks that way." Sarah pointed behind Chuck.

He turned around so he could see what she was pointing at. "Really? Can we go see it?"

"Why? It's just an apartment building."

"But you lived there…"

"Not really, I mean I had some stuff there, but I lived there six years, I spent maybe a few weeks worth of nights there. It's someone else's apartment now."

"So you used to come to this restaurant a lot?" Chuck asked.

"When I was staying there, yes."

"Cool." Chuck smiled and Sarah blushed under the force of his grin.

"What's cool?" Sarah asked.

"This is like a real part of your life. I mean, you're sharing. You really like it here." Sarah nodded as Antonio brought them chips and salsa with two glasses of water. He'd offered each of them a cerveza, but Sarah had turned him down and Chuck was contemplating never drinking again. They made their order and Antonio headed back to the kitchen."I like it when you show me things about yourself. It helps," Chuck explained. "I'd still really like to see your old apartment building."

"Okay," Sarah shrugged.

Chuck dipped a chip in salsa and took a bite. It took three or four seconds before he realized his mouth was on fire. His throat hurt as he swallowed. "Hot!" Chuck gasped. "Hot!"

"Oh…yes, Antonio likes the food to be spicy. I should have warned you."

"I like spicy food," Chuck objected. "That was like eating fire." Chuck took another chip and ate it without any salsa and as he suspected he couldn't taste more than just a little salt. "I think I burned off my taste buds."

"That's probably for the best. Otherwise it would be hard for you to eat your meal." Sarah took a chip with a generous helping of salsa and crunched on it. "Mmm, that's even better than I remember!"

"How can you do that to yourself?" Chuck asked.

Sarah shrugged. "You have to learn to like spicy foods when you're a spy. When you're undercover you can't bite into a traditional local dish and wince. They'll make you for sure. I started eating here because it had the spiciest food in the neighborhood. It helped me build up my tolerance."

"So why are we eating here now?"

"I like it here. I wanted to bring you someplace where I had a past. You're always so tied up knowing what I used to be like. I actually used to come here. Most places I don't visit very often. I don't want to leave anyone behind who recognizes me, but I've been here dozens of times. I thought you might like coming to one of my favorite restaurants…even if you have to suffer a bit. Plus, you deserve a little pay back for what you did to my car."

Chuck smiled grimly. "So that's what this is? Revenge?"

Sarah smirked. "Maybe just a little."

"That's just mean."

"You did pretty much ruin my car."

"Point taken," Chuck acquiesced. He ate another chip with just the tiniest bit of salsa on it. His mouth didn't burn off so he tried another. "So…tell me about the FBI."

"It was fine. As expected it's a bunch of G-Men in cheap suits and bad hair cuts. They were acceptable for the work we're doing. If we ever have to do anything undercover, then I'm a little more concerned. Considering Fulcrum consists almost entirely of G-Man types I'm guessing they'd do okay as long as some of them can act."

"Are they nice?"

Sarah shrugged. "I don't know, I just really wish I didn't have to do this." Sarah ran her fingers through her hair. She fiddled with the ends for a moment before her eyes locked on to Chuck's. "I get that you aren't sure about me, yet."

"Sarah, I…" Chuck started, but Sarah cut him off.

"Just hang on a sec," Sarah reached out and gripped his hand. "I know what it's like to doubt someone. I'm disappointed that you doubt me, but I'm willing to wait. I'm willing to go slow. What I need to know is what you want out of us. Do you even want a relationship?"

"Of course!" Chuck interjected.

"That's good."

"Because you aren't wasting your time?" Chuck asked.

Sarah shot him an irritated look. "Believe it or not, even if you and I never figure out this relationship, I wouldn't consider time with you to be wasted." Sarah looked down at the old beaten up table that they were sitting at and ran her fingers over the nicks and dents from thousands of meals served.

"I didn't mean—" Chuck started.

Sarah immediately interrupted him. "I'm a different person when I'm with you."

"What?" Chuck asked.

"I don't know," Sarah shook her head. "I can't really explain it. I just…growing up with my Dad, never knowing my Mom, changing friends every few months and then my Dad left. I just." Sarah voice hitched slightly and she blew out a long breath.

"What's wrong?" Chuck asked.

"I don't know how to say what I mean." Sarah flexed her hands in the air for a moment.

"It's okay," Chuck said softly.

"No, it's not." Sarah slammed her hands against the table. "I should be able to do this." But just then a man came out of the kitchen with their food and presented it on the table. Chuck watched Sarah as she struggled with whatever she was trying to say. She allowed herself to be distracted by her food and tore into the enchilada she had ordered. Chuck watched her eat in silence for a minute or two before he took a bite of his own meal.

Chuck's eyes nearly burst out of his head, despite the incident with the salsa earlier the pain on his tongue was unbearable. He desperately wanted to spit out the bite of spicy carnitas taco he'd taken, but he didn't want to look like a wimp. He swallowed it in an attempt to put out the fire in his mouth, but it just burned all the way down. "How can you just sit there and eat that, like your mouth isn't on fire?" Chuck wheezed.

"I like spicy food," Sarah replied.

"I don't even think I can eat this," Chuck replied.

"But you enjoy spicy food too, we've gone out for…"

Chuck stopped her. "I don't mind food that's spicy, but this," he waived helplessly at the table, "is extreme."

Sarah frowned. "You don't like it?"

"Sarah, my eyes are watering and I feel like that one bite of carnitas is going burn a hole through my stomach. I like that you shared this place with me, but I don't think I can eat this." Chuck pointed to his plate. "Wasabi is one thing, but you don't even like wasabi that much, that's way easier to eat than this…"

"I just don't like my sushi drowned in wasabi. I love spicy Thai." Sarah shrugged. "I thought maybe a mutual enjoyment of spicy food could maybe be our thing."

"What?"

Sarah glanced away. "Couples are supposed to have things in common. You certainly have a lot in common with that Vanessa girl. But I don't like video games or computers or…"

Chuck reached out and grabbed Sarah's hand. "You don't have to compete with Van."

"But she likes you and last night you said…"

"Van is really nice. I do like her _as a friend_, but… I don't know, I guess after three years of watching you put yourself out to protect me and finding out what an amazing and fascinating woman you are, it'd be hard to settle for someone like Van."

"Fascinating huh?" Sarah asked, seeming to have forgotten all about her dinner.

"Yeah," Chuck agreed. "And beautiful and brave and caring." Sarah's gaze leveled on him with a single eyebrow raised. "What?" Chuck asked.

"Please" Sarah replied grinning. "Do go on."

* * *

It felt like a real date. Not a first date or even a fourth date. It was like they were actually a real couple doing real couple things. Sarah held his hand as they walked down the street and she pointed out the window of her old apartment.

There was absolutely nothing remarkable about it. That bothered Chuck. The old stone building was important. There should at least be some sort of commemorative plaque or something. Maybe a giant billboard that said _Sarah Walker used to live here!_

The building was apparently filled with congressional pages and interns. Sarah had laughed when she told him that she occasionally saw her old neighbors on TV. Chuck wasn't sure how that was possible, with Casey gone, they watched very little CSPAN.

After seeing the building Chuck made Sarah walk around with him and show him her favorite spots in the neighborhood.

The coffee shop she'd liked was gone. There was a dry cleaner there. The dry cleaner she'd like was gone and there was a pizza parlor there. Beyond that, there wasn't much in the neighborhood that Sarah thought stood out.

"Oh, I know something!" Sarah exclaimed excitedly.

Chuck laughed. "What now, a pharmacy that's turned into a bowling alley?" Sarah bit her lip. Then she frowned.

"What is it?"

"I don't know if I should take you there…"

"Where?"

"It's where I used to jog. I used to go there every morning when I was in town."

"That sounds perfect!" Chuck smiled happily, but it didn't pass along to Sarah.

She linked their hands together and pointed with both of their arms. "It's this way," she said quietly

They wandered a few blocks, but Sarah's apprehension only seemed to increase as they wandered closer. Chuck couldn't understand it. Sarah was practically squirming when they arrived at Rock Creek Park and started walking down the trail.

"This is really nice," Chuck remarked. He turned to Sarah. "Is it always this beautiful?"

Sarah mumbled something or other.

"Are you okay?" Chuck asked.

"I'm fine," Sarah replied. She gave him a thin smile. She was anything, but fine.

"You don't want me here, do you?" Chuck asked.

"No!" Sarah exclaimed her eyes growing wide. "It's not that."

"Then what's wrong?"

"Bryce and I…" The bottom fell out of Chuck's stomach and Sarah must have noticed because she didn't continue.

Chuck sucked in a deep breath and let out a little chuckle. "You and Bryce would have a history in D.C. wouldn't you?"

Sarah nodded slowly. "We used to meet up in the park…jog together… I'm sorry. You probably don't want to be here. I just didn't think about it until after I suggested it."

"It's fine," Chuck assured her. He really didn't want to hear about her time with Bryce. He'd done his best to forget about it, but if they were really going to be a couple, then Chuck would have to face his old roommate once more.

"You're allowed to have ex-boyfriends," Chuck tried to say in a completely supportive tone. It was a bit of a struggle but he hoped the effort might count for something. . Sarah looked even more uncomfortable at the use of that term. "Sarah, really, it's fine." It was not fine, but ignoring her history with Bryce would only make the specter of him larger.

Chuck pulled her along the path slowly. Sarah still seemed bothered and Chuck finally picked up on something he'd been missing. "Do you want to talk about it?"

Sarah shrugged. "I wasn't really planning on tonight being about airing the exes."

"You seem bothered by my being here, that's all."

Sarah eyed him warily. "Bryce and I weren't a normal couple," she stated.

It wasn't news to Chuck. "And that bothers you why?"

"Bryce and I were partners for two years," Sarah said. She fidgeted with a loose thread on the hem of her jacket.. Chuck nudged her gently urging her to continue.

"Most of the time it wasn't really serious. Our relationship was mostly sex between missions. When we were both in DC, we'd have meetings and stuff, but in the mornings we'd meet here in the park and jog. It was the most normal couple thing we really did."

"Couldn't you have just stayed over and gone jogging in the morning?"

Sarah shook her head. "We never did that, really. We were together so much when we were out on the road, we spent most of our time stateside getting to be alone for the first time in months. Sometimes our morning jog was the only time I'd see him. He was always here though. Always. Sometimes we'd have breakfast afterward, usually not. We'd go our separate ways and either catch up at the office or I'd see him here the next day. I never knew what he was doing. We had a silent agreement not to ask… The day after it happened I was waiting here in the park. Bryce never showed… I started jogging on my own. I was about a mile that way," Sarah pointed. "When I got a call from Director Graham.

"That's the last time I was here…"

"Oh," Chuck replied. They walked in silence for a few moments. Chuck finally decided to pull her closer. "I can see why you wouldn't want me here."

"It's not you," Sarah replied. "This is one of my favorite places in the world. I just… I guess there are still feelings here."

"It's not a crime, Sarah," Chuck assured her. "You're allowed to still have feelings about Bryce. Do you still love him?" Chuck asked.

"No!" Sarah objected. She gave him an odd look. "God, no! Why would you think that?" Sarah turned away. "I found out that the only stable thing in my life was dead, while I was in this park. It turns out he wasn't dead. It turns out, that turn of events was good for me. It turns out that what I thought I felt for Bryce wasn't what I thought it was, but I still remember what it felt like when Director Graham told me."

"I can understand that," Chuck nodded.

"Five hours later I was in Burbank and onto a better life. I've never really thought about this place."

"Better life?" Chuck was a bit dubious about the statement but Sarah didn't give a response. He thought better than to challenge her at this point and let the comment slide.

They continued walking along for a bit. It was getting dark. There was a lit path, but it wasn't the one they were on. They finally came upon a junction of two different paths. Sarah pointed to a concrete bench. "That's where we used to meet."

Sarah looked decidedly unsettled looking at the old bench."We can go whenever you want," Chuck offered.

Sarah shrugged. "We probably should. It's getting dark." She offered him the first real smile he'd seen since she'd suggested they come here. "I'm glad you were here with me."

Chuck laughed depreciatingly. "I don't know how much I helped. I seem to keep saying the wrong things."

Sarah tugged him closerand squeezed him in a tight hug. "You always help."

Chuck watched the moonlight glistening on her lips. He was sure he was being invited for a kiss, but it seemed inappropriate somehow. Sarah kept looking up at him. Her gaze was open, but he could feel the challenge. He dipped his head and pressed his lips gently against hers. Her entire body slumped against him as she kissed him back. They broke apart after a few minutes, but Sarah seemed much more relaxed as they started walking back.

"Thanks for tonight," Chuck said as they got back to the Crown Vic.

"It wasn't exactly what I was expecting," Sarah sighed.

"It was perfect."

Sarah laughed and shook her head. "Every place I tried to show you was gone. You couldn't eat dinner. I got emotional over a walk in the park…"

"Sure," Chuck agreed. "But it was all very real pieces of you. I'm glad you let me see them."

Sarah didn't respond as she got into the car, but when she pulled away from the parking space she took a very firm grip on Chuck's hand.

* * *

_A/N: A big thanks goes out to Malamoo for doing the beta work on this chapter. She's not just a great writer and a handy beta, she'd a very good friend. If you haven't read her work yet…where've you been Tora Bora?_

_As much as I'd like for this to be my triumphant return to fan fiction, I can offer no promises for the dates of future chapters. I've got another about a third written, but since I wrote this story stream of consciousness, even I barely remember what's going on at this point. All I know is that everyone likes Van…you're rooting for Van right?_


	17. Chapter 17: The Spook

_**Disclaimer:**__** I don't own Chuck. I mean come on, duh. **_

_**A/N:**__ This chapter was generously beta'd by the beautiful and talented Malamoo, tell her how much you miss her by leaving her a note in my reviews. Wow…that was self serving. You don't have to leave me a review you can send her a personal note, but it's only fair that she know we all miss her beautiful writing. Thanks again Moo!_

**Chapter 17: The Spook**

Chuck awoke to the blaring of the clock radio and rolled over to shut it off. The bed was cold. That meant that Sarah wasn't there and that she hadn't been there, probably for the entire night. It had become far too frequent of an occurrence. It's not that he minded sleeping alone, although he had gotten somewhat used to waking up with Sarah draped across him, it's just that it meant Sarah wasn't sleeping.

She'd been pulling all nighters for the FBI, while Chuck stayed home and worked on code for the NSA until he couldn't keep his eyes open anymore. Neither of them were sleeping enough. Chuck grunted in agitation and as he pulled himself out of bed. It seemed like he'd barely seen her since their date. That had been two weeks ago and while it seemed like real progress had been made that night, not seeing your girlfriend for a couple of weeks sort of put a damper on the relationship.

Chuck pulled himself out of bed and shuffled out to the kitchen. Sarah was at the table drinking coffee. As beautiful to him as she might be, when she looked up and gave a wan smile, she still looked dreadful. Dark circles where starting to form under her eyes and she was very pale.

"Morning," she said to Chuck. She waited patiently for him to come over and give her a kiss. It wasn't second nature yet, but Chuck was catching on. Besides, if he didn't do what Sarah expected, she'd just wait until he figured it out. So far the system was working most of the time. Chuck's back complained over having to stoop so far so he intended to keep the kiss brief but Sarah caught his hand to keep him close.

"You didn't sleep?" Chuck asked.

Sarah brushed aside Chuck's concern. "I'll get a few zees at my desk this morning."

"Sarah… you have to sleep sometimes," Chuck admonished.

"I've done more with less," she assured him. "Can you be ready in twenty?"

"Are we in a hurry?"

"I've got a conference call right at eight. I'd like to catch the earlier bus if we can."

"I thought you were going to sleep at the office?" Chuck asked.

"After," Sarah assured him.

Chuck frowned and squeezed her hand before he hurried off to the shower.

Chuck glanced behind him once again and sighed. Sarah's office door was still open and she still wasn't in it. She'd promised him that she'd catch a nap at her desk, but she'd left her office about an hour after they came in and he hadn't seen her since.

He hoped she was somewhere getting a nap, but he doubted it. Chuck was concerned for her safety. She couldn't be everywhere doing everything.

"Okay, seriously, what's up?" an irritated voice asked.

Chuck whipped around to see Van's head peaking over the cubicle wall.

"What?" Chuck asked.

"You're vibrating over there and you're shaking the cubicle wall. Why are you so uptight?"

"I'm not uptight."

Van gave him an irritated look. Her head disappeared over the cubicle wall and Chuck thought he had gotten a reprieve until she appeared in his cubicle—_in_ his cubicle. Just because there wasn't a door didn't mean this wasn't personal space, most people stood just outside his cubicle to talk to him, but things had become different with Van since the bar. Now she had developed the habit of coming right in and sitting on his desk, letting her feet dangle just next to his thigh.

As soon as Vanessa took a seat on his desk, Chuck pushed himself as far back as his chair would allow and still be considered in the cubicle.

. "Spill," She demanded.

Chuck shrugged. "What?"

"Something's bothering you and I want to know what it is."

Chuck fidgeted slightly, absently clicking his pen over and over. In spite of his years as a spy he'd never gotten very good a lying to people's faces. "Really it's nothing."

"Uh huh," Van crossed her arms and waited. When Chuck didn't give she started gently kicking his chair with her shoe as she swung her feet.

"Stop that," Chuck insisted.

"I would, if you'd just tell me what's up with you."

"Maybe it's personal, Van? Did you ever think of that?" Richard asked from the cube next door.

Richard never stood up to Van so this came as a bit of a shock to Chuck.

"Is that it?" Van asked. "It's about a girrrrl?" she asked teasingly.

"No," Chuck shook his head. "It's nothing like that."

Van leaned forward pinning him with her gaze. The front of her shirt also gaped enough for Chuck to catch a peek of her cleavage, but he didn't give her the satisfaction; he kept his eyes squarely on hers. "Then what?" she asked.

Just then Chuck caught something out of the corner of his eye. Sarah was looking at him as she closed her door, disappearing from view. _Where'd she go all morning?_

"So it is about a girl."

Chuck turned back to Van who was still leaning towards him. "So that's it? You like the spook?" Van asked, sounding a bit hurt.

"The who?" Chuck asked.

"The spook," Van pointed down the hall.

Chuck's stomach turned. "You think she's a spy?"

Van rolled her eyes. "Everyone _knows_ she a spy."

Chuck panicked. "What? How?"

Van finally leaned away and pushed herself back on Chuck's desk, partially sitting on some documents he'd been working on before her little visit. "Well, see the thing is, people who just randomly show up, never talk to anyone, nobody knows who they are or anything about them…" Van trailed off. "It's not like it's uncommon, but come on, you know what we do here, they're spooks. Everyone knows."

"They do?" Chuck was starting to have trouble breathing.

"Relax, she's not here to spy on you," Van dismissed the notion with a wave of her hand.

"Who then?" Chuck asked

Van shrugged. "Probably just working on a project for one of the other agencies or waiting to get assigned to a better task."

"How do you know all this?"

"It's common sense, Chuck, people who look like that don't work desk jobs at the NSA. I mean come on."

"It's true," Richard added from the cube next door.

"You work here," Chuck pointed out.

Van beamed at him. "Thank you!"

"What?" Now Chuck was confused.

"You think I look hot enough to be a spook!"

Richard sniggered from the other cube. Van stuck her tongue out at the wall.

"Oh…well, yeah, you're very pretty," Chuck offered.

"Oh stop," Van batted his shoulder.

Chuck thought that was probably fair, she was his coworker. He probably shouldn't say things like that about her. Especially if she didn't want to hear it, so Chuck didn't bother to elaborate.

Van waited for a moment before her focus turned to Sarah's door again. "Well just forget about her, Chuck, spooks are dangerous people. One day she's flirting with you and the next you're in an underground bunker accused of treason. There are plenty of other options."

"You're crazy," Chuck told her. "She's not like that."

"You've spoken to her?" Van looked shocked. Richard's head suddenly appeared over the cubicle wall. Van and Richard looked at each other for a moment. "What'd she say?"

"I don't know, we just talked a little. She takes my bus."

"You ride the bus to work…with the spook?" Richard clarified speaking slowly.

"Well…yeah."

"And you talked to her?"

"Yeah?"

Simon appeared around the cube wall. "What's going on?"

"Chuck knows the spook," Richard explained.

"The one at the end of the hall?" Simon asked.

"He's got a crush on her," Van added.

"Who doesn't?" Simon snorted.

"Oh she's not so great, tell them Chuck," Van prompted.

"What?"

"Tell them what you said."

"About what?"

Van stared at him, but he had no idea what she was waiting for.

"So what's she like?" Simon asked.

Chuck hesitated for a moment. "She's really nice. Her name's Sarah."

"Spook name," Van huffed.

Chuck shot her a startled look. "Um yeah, I don't know, we've talked a few times. She just started right before I did. So she doesn't really know anybody."

"Because she's a spook," Van added.

"She's not a spook!" Chuck objected. He was getting irritated by the name.

"How do you know?" Van demanded.

"Because we've talked. She's just a regular person."

Simon, Richard and Van all exchanged glances. Simon somehow got elected to break the news to Chuck. "Look, Chuck, we've all worked here a while. You get a feel for these things when people show up. "She's a spook."

"What does that even mean? Aren't all of us spies?" Chuck asked. "Isn't that what we do here?"

"Like half the people in the building are spies," Richard explained. "They intercept phone calls, monitor internet chat rooms, track bank records… the spooks are field agents. They're ghosts. They come and go and nobody ever even knows who they were. Her name is probably not even Sarah. They're just ghosts, they don't really exist."

"Okay, you're all crazy," Chuck told them. Simon and Richard adopted a sympathetic look, Van still looked irritated.

"Are you all on lunch or something?" They all turned to find Michael standing outside Chuck's cube.

"No," Van shook her head. "We were just helping Chuck out with a problem."

"I'm sure," Michael said sardonically. "Chuck has work to do, so do the rest of you."

"Dude, relax, you're not the boss," Simon shot Michael a nasty look.

"No, but Chuck's working for me, so I'd appreciate it, if you let him get back to work or I can talk to Tom."

"Sheesh, don't be such a dick, no wonder Van dumped you." Simon stalked off in one direction and Michael turned red, but spun around and walked off on in the other. Richard sat back down in his cube and Van stood up to go back to hers.

Instead she hesitated and put her hand on his shoulder. "Just be careful, Chuck. Spooks are dangerous people."

Chuck watched Sarah swaying on the bus. She had her face buried in her book as usual and Chuck knew she had one eye on him in case there was anyone dangerous on the bus, but really she'd relaxed a lot from their first few trips. The fact that Chuck had flashed on other passengers only twice so far probably helped. He'd flashed that many times at the pizza place where they sometimes stopped on the way home from work. It was just a hazard of living in the greater D.C. area; everyone it seemed was in the Intersect.

They got off the bus and both took rather circular routes back to the car. Chuck had begun feeling like these precautions were a little bit silly, which made it slightly easier to broach the subject of their cover when they got back to the car, but first-

"Did you get any sleep at all today?" Chuck asked once they were safely locked in the car.

Sarah shrugged. "A little."

"How little?" Chuck demanded.

"Enough," Sarah sighed.

"See I disagree, maybe I should be the one driving…"

Sarah glanced at him, but didn't respond.

"Really, Sarah, you need to rest. You could catch a nap on the way home."

Sarah reached over and squeezed his hand. "I appreciate the concern, but I'm a trained operative, I can go days without sleep."

The comment didn't make Chuck feel any more assured. He wanted to protest more, but he knew it wasn't going to go anywhere, so he brought up the other subject of conversation.

"So…my coworkers made you today."

Sarah's posture changed from loose and relaxed to stiff in an instant. "Made me?" She clarified. "What did you tell her?"

"Tell who?"

"I saw her in your cubicle, Chuck."

"They were all in my cubicle and I didn't tell them anything. They've just been around the NSA office long enough to spot an agent. Well, they call them spooks, but that's what they mean."

"They were not all in your cubicle they were around your cubicle only _she_, was _in_ your cubicle. What do you mean they spotted me?"

Chuck sighed. "The people that show up out of nowhere and don't work for anybody in particular. People that have a certain…air, I guess. They all think you're a spook."

Sarah frowned at Chuck for more than four Mississippi's he hated it when she did that while she was driving. "Sarah…the road?"

"It's fine," Sarah replied, but she did turn her gaze back to the road. "They know I'm an agent?"

"Pretty much."

"Well that's bothersome. Maybe I'll just have them all eliminated. I'll start with the red head."

"Sarah!" Chuck squawked. "You can't…" Chuck noticed the smile. "You're messing with me."

"Pretty much."

"Nice," Chuck replied petulantly.

"Oh come on," Sarah shoved his shoulder. "It's not that big of a deal, we'll just convince them I'm not a spook."

"But you are a spook."

"Well, what they don't know, won't hurt them."

"I think we should tell them."

"That we're spies? You know we can't…"

"No about us," Chuck prodded. "Although they seemed to find it highly unlikely that I could interest you."

"Is that it, it's a matter of pride?" Sarah asked.

"No!" Chuck sighed. "No, I just think it might be easier on you, if we could just drive to the office instead of all this cover stuff."

Sarah shrugged. "It's probably been long enough, we could start dropping some hints. Perhaps if they see me talking to you in the hall they won't think I'm a spook." Sarah smiled.

Chuck smiled sardonically. "Trust me, it's going to take more than a few conversations before they believe I've got a shot."

"True," Sarah nodded. "I do seem out of your league."

"Hey!"

Sarah smirked. "Hey yourself, you're the one that keeps bringing it up."

She pulled them to their house in Severna Park. "Now hop out, I've got to get to my next job."

Chuck opened the door to the car. "I'm really starting to hate you having two jobs."

Sarah shrugged. "Not much we can do about it now."

Chuck unfolded himself from the car. Then he thought better of it. He put his satchel down in the driveway and sat back down.

"What's wrong?" Sarah asked.

Chuck made his way across the ample console of the government car until he could reach Sarah. He bent down and gave her a kiss. Chuck felt a little awkward being the one to push the action, but he tried to put all the promise he could into it. Chuck pulled back after more than a minute had passed. "Be home in time for bed?" he asked.

Sarah's eyes were slightly glazed and it took her a moment to focus. She shook her head and blink. "Yeah." Then realizing what she said she shook herself again. "I mean I'll try."

Chuck kissed her again. "For me?"

Sarah frowned. "Now who's fighting dirty?"

Chuck gave her the old Bartowski eyebrow dance. "You started it."

Sarah closed her eyes and let out a long breath. "Get out of here, you're making me late for work." When he didn't move back immediately she put a hand on his face and pushed him back towards the door. "You are trouble," she told him. "Big **giant** trouble."

Chuck smirked. "I do believe I'll take that as a compliment."

Sarah huffed. "You're going to be the end of me, Chuck Bartowski."

If the people at the office only knew, Chuck mused.

_A/N: So another chapter of this dragging story… I was recently inspired to work on this some more by a well meaning fan. (Who is currently writing their own fanficiton of this fanfiction.) I still can't promise it'll reach the finish line, but I've written a few more chapters to tack on here and with any luck (and a late start to the Chuck season) I'll finish it before the actual Chuck writers suck what little love I have left for the series straight out of me. Sorry it didn't come sooner or easier, but honestly I'm shocked to be writing it again. _

_Wow…that might be the most depressing author's note ever. _


	18. Chapter 18 Meanwhile, Back at the Lab

_**Disclaimer:**_ _**Chuck is likely to be eaten by a Grue and isn't owned by me**_.

_Real Life 20:__ Meanwhile, Back at the Lab._

Chuck awoke hot and uncomfortable. It wasn't an unusual sensation. When they'd first started living together Sarah would go to sleep on her own side of the bed and somehow over the course of the night end up curled around him. It wasn't something he complained about. Having the hottest woman you've ever known pressed up against you wasn't exactly the sort of thing that needed to be complained about. However, in recent weeks since they'd started clicking better out of bed, Sarah had given up the pretense of unintentional cuddling.

When she came to bed in the wee hours of the morning she generally just collapsed on top of him. Again, not something he was prepared to complain about, but it was quite warm sleeping under another person and he almost always woke up with either an arm or a leg asleep and frequently part of his anatomy showing very little discretion. He really hoped that Sarah didn't mind, because there was little if anything he could do about it.

Today was a big day. Today they were taking the bus together and walking into the NSA together and saying goodbye in front of the crew. It wasn't actually that big of a deal and Chuck didn't know why he felt such anticipation. Just one less thing to lie about he guessed.

Chuck took his knuckles and brushed them along Sarah's cheek. He'd found over the last week or so, that she was much less grumpy when woken gently and with the proper motivation. He supposed that was his job in this relationship, to find things that made Sarah happy.

Her eyelids flickered and her lips curled into a smile. Chuck could only barely see as her head was using his shoulder for a pillow. .

"Time to get up already?" Sarah mumbled.

"Sorry," Chuck replied.

"Don't be sorry," she sighed.

Chuck worked his arm out from underneath Sarah and started brushing his hand up and down her tank top towards the small of her back. Then, rather impertinently, he slipped his hand underneath and brushed against her soft skin.

Sarah moaned.

Chuck worked his arm up as far as his elbow could bend with Sarah making small contented noises against his shoulder.

"Oh, don't stop," Sarah whined.

"Time for work, Sweetie."

"Sweetie?"

"I'm trying it out," Chuck replied.

"Okay, but the alarm hasn't even…" Sarah's complaint was interrupted by the wail of the Police's _Roxanne_ blaring from the clock radio. "Damn."

They disentangled for a moment to shut off the alarm. Sarah usually went straight into the bathroom after that, but today, she flopped back down and propped her head on her elbow.

"Hi," Chuck said.

"Hi," Sarah grinned.

"Shouldn't you be getting ready?"

"I need to talk to you."

"Oh?" Chuck raised an eyebrow. At least he hoped it was only one, he'd been practicing.

"Yeah, look, Derrick's cooperating and based on a tip he gave us, we acquired something."

"That's great!"

"Yeah, it is. We captured a phone, unfortunately the agent it belongs to escaped."

"That sucks."

"I know, but we have one of their phones and we think it might be a big deal on figuring out how Fulcrum communicates without anyone ever picking up their communications."

"Okaaay?" He was at a loss for why they needed to talk about his now.

"Well I submitted to phone to the NSA for analysis, but I left very specific instructions on who was to work on it. It's coming to you."

"Ah," Chuck nodded. "Um why?"

"The phone has some weird encryption on it. Derrick helped develop it, but they've changed it somehow and he's not quite sure how to break it. He has notes, but apparently they modified the encryption algorithm he used after he gave it to them. He's not sure what they did, but Chuck, if we can crack their encryption, we could possibly listen to their communications!"

"Okay, sure," Chuck nodded along. "But why me? Wouldn't Derrick be the best person to break the encryption?"

"Possibly, yes." Sarah agreed. "But Director Arvil isn't going to let him. He's still under indictment for several crimes including treason. It's sealed right now, but unless information Derrick provides leads to the direct capture of significant Fulcrum operatives, they're going to push forward with the case. Derrick's not going to be touching a phone anytime soon."

Chuck ran his fingers through his hair. "So why me? I'm like the least senior member of my department."

"Because," Sarah smiled. "You're brilliant and you're the only one I trust with something this important."

Sarah's expression was so innocent and honest, that her compliment was almost too big for him. He _was_ intelligent, he'd been able to get himself through Stanford, but Sarah went to Harvard, she certainly wasn't a slouch in the brains department. Rather, it was because he was the only one she trusted with something this important. That was…

Chuck was momentarily distracted when Sarah slithered up his body and kissed him.

"What was that for?"

"You're so cute, when you have that momentary doubt right before you get the burst of inspiration that lets you solve the problem. I love that."

Chuck blinked. _Loves._ She loves that. Granted she hadn't said that she loved _him._ Just that she _loved_ that thing about him. He glanced back at her face and she was giving him the grin of a serious troublemaker.

Then she was gone.

"We're late!" She yelled. "Race you to the front door!"

Chuck was so preoccupied by their previous conversation that he'd forgotten that they were going to work together. Sarah sat down beside him on the bus and breathlessly said. "Hi Chuck, how are you this morning?"

The other passengers on the bus watched them for a moment as they exchanged idle chit-chat, but lost interest soon enough in what they were saying.

They talked about the weather and the book Sarah always read on the way to work. It was trash she admitted, but she loved love stories. Chuck filed this away to find out if it was really true or not. Chuck asked her if she'd seen any good movies lately and she lamented that she hadn't been to a movie in ages.

She countered to Chuck with the same question and he lamented since moving to Maryland he hadn't had a chance see any movies and he didn't really know anybody to go with. Going to the movies by yourself was kind of depressing.

"Oh," Sarah said. "Maybe I could go with you?"

"Really?" Chuck asked.

"Sure, I have some time this weekend." Sarah assured him.

Chuck wasn't sure if this was real time, or if they were still just play acting. "Like on Saturday?"

Sarah pulled a disgruntled face. "No Saturday's no good. I might have to work. But I'm free on Sunday!"

"Really?" Chuck asked.

Sarah nodded in reply.

"Do you maybe want to go catch a movie on Sunday? "

"Sure! It's a date!" Sarah agreed.

Just like that NSA Chuck and CIA Sarah had their first official cover date.

There was a business man who always rode the bus with them that routinely got off two stops before them. When Chuck looked up from this exchange he noticed that the man was staring at him in disbelief. His mouth hung open and he glanced from Chuck to Sarah as if he couldn't believe what just happened. They passed his stop and in his stupor the man didn't so much as glance at the exit. In fact he was still sitting there shaking his head as Chuck and Sarah excited the bus and started walking to NSA building.

Walking alongside Sarah in the NSA was a completely different experience than his normal schlep from the bus stop. Chuck was rarely noticed as he wound his way through the building most days. Walking alongside Sarah and chatting idly EVERYONE noticed. It was as if he'd suddenly grown two heads.

It wasn't like he'd never experienced the phenomenon before, but it had been several months and he'd forgotten what it felt like.

"Well, have a good day," Sarah said as she left him by his cube.

"You too, see you tonight?" Chuck asked. "You know, on the return bus?"

Sarah smiled brilliantly at him. "Sure, see you tonight!"

Chuck turned back towards the cubicles to find heads poking up from about half of them, watching Chuck say goodbye to Sarah.

"Nice!" Simon cheered as Chuck walked back towards his cubicle.

"Wait until Van hears about this." Richard shook his head. "She's going to flip her lid."

Van, notorious for being the last member of the team to her cube in the morning would just have to wait, Chuck smiled.

"Chuck can you step into my office for a minute?"

Chuck wasn't exactly surprised by the request. He'd been expecting it since this morning. It still felt a little unnerving having his boss call him into his office. He'd not stepped foot in there since his first day.

"Sure, Tom," Chuck replied. He followed Tom back to his office and was a bit surprised to see Van sitting in one of the two chairs on the 'visitor' side of Tom's desk. She was smiling and as Chuck slipped into the other seat she gave him a wink.

"So, Chuck," Tom began, "You've been doing a great job for Michael up here. He says you really have an eye for helping make code efficient. So now that you've gotten your feet wet, I was thinking about letting you tackle a new project. How's that sound?"

"Uh, sure," Chuck replied. He was making it sound like, Chuck had passed some sort of test, but Chuck knew for a fact that Sarah had specifically asked for him to work on the project. It sounded kind of odd spun that way and Chuck was confused as to why Van would be here for this conversation.

"Great!" Tom smiled. "Well, I've just gotten a new assignment for our group and I want you to work on it. " Tom beamed at Chuck, as if Chuck should take this as a great promotion. Chuck glanced uncertainly at Van.

Tom finally deciding he wasn't going to get an excited reaction from Chuck continued. "You're going to be the project lead, but this is an important project and I didn't want to just throw you to the wolves the first time out. Van, here has agreed to help you with the project and show you the ropes when it comes to project management. Plus she has a lot of experience with cell phone encryption, so I think she can really help you when it comes to breaking the encryption on this." Tom pulled a large locked box out from under his desk.

"I haven't seen it yet, but it's supposed to be pretty cool. The boys in tech only got to look at it for a few minutes before they sent it up here to be decrypted. They're anxious to get their hands on it when you've broken the decryption. Might even let you play with it a little once they figure out how it works," Tom said encouragingly.

"Uh thanks," Tom passed the box over to him. The box was marked Confidential: Level Three:ONLY. Chuck glanced down at his badge which showed his security clearance to be level two.

"Oh, right," Tom shook his head and then fished around in his desk for a moment. He passed Chuck a new badge. It declared him Charles Carmichael, Security Clearance Level Three. Vanessa held up her badge to show that they matched.

"Cool huh?" she said.

"Yeah…"

"You'll be working in the lab for the duration of the project," Tom explained. "Can't have any extraneous eyes getting on this." He passed the box to Chuck and gave the key to Vanessa.

"You know the rules, Vanessa. Good luck, I look forward to your first progress report!" Tom waved them off and Chuck followed Vanessa down the hallway. They eventually got to a steel door marked "2" and Vanessa scanned her badge at the door and put her finger on a pad.

"You have to do it too," she said.

She took her finger off the pad and the sign above the door changed from a green:Open to a red:Restricted.

"Pretty cool, huh?" Van said as she pressed the locked code on the door. "Now we're the only two people in the whole world that can get in here. She smirked at him. "Whatever will we get up to?"

She propped the door open with her back and led Chuck inside. It was a bit like the cage at the Buy More, except everything was spotlessly clean and every tool appeared to brand new.

Vanessa smiled. "Behind this wall," she ran her fingers across a gleaming white wall, "Is a Cray CX1000 and it's ours…all ours, until the end of the project." She was practically purring by the end of her explanation.

"Wow…" was all Chuck could say. He was left in a state of shock and awe by what he was faced with.

Vanessa showed him around the rest of the lab, including the safe where their subject equipment was to be locked whenever the door to the lab was opened. It was all very super secretive and Chuck had to admit he was a little surprised that this facility was just down the hall from his cubicle. He'd had no idea. Did everyone else in the cube know about this facility? What other things secrets were hidden in this building?

"Shall we take a look at our project?" Vanessa asked.

"Sure."

Chuck put the box on the work bench and Van used the key Tom had given her to unlock the box. Van picked up the odd looking device and poked at it for a bit. It turned on briefly when she attempted to press what appeared to be the power button, but then a message popped up that said access denied and it shut back down.

Van gave it a pouty frown. "I don't think it likes me."

Vanessa's knowledge of cell phones proved extensive. Chuck had worked on hundreds of different models in his time at the Nerd Herd, but Vanessa had disassembled the phone practically down to just the circuit board in about two and half minutes. The display was still attached but off to the side, the various keys were still connected, but Van had a volt meter hooked up to the wires leading to the keys and various connectors tied across different wires. In almost no time they were getting little bits of code flitting by, but it all looked like gibberish.

"Well there's the task, boss," she said. "How do you want to break it?"

Chuck had initially been somewhat annoyed that Tom had assigned Van to the project. From talking to Sarah that morning it was just supposed to be him working on this, but he had to admit, there was no way he'd have broken into the substructure of the phone that quickly. He was impressed to say the least.

"Um, I don't know," Chuck admitted. He was actually quite glad Van was here to help him on this, it wouldn't do to not know what was going on his first time out. "Let me take a look."

Chuck got out a huge magnifying lens that swung out over the work table and started examining the circuit board.

"That's a huge processor," Van commented at Chuck poked at the different parts of the phone's circuitry.

"There's no video screen or fancy graphics, but that looks like a GPU, what do you suppose it's for?" Van asked.

Chuck had seen the innards of hundreds of phones during his time at the Buy More, but this phone confused him.

Van was looking at the battery. "How do you suppose they powered it? This doesn't look big enough to run a processor that size."

Chuck had to admit he didn't know. "Think of the heat this must put off… This phone would burn your ear off."

"Depends on the voltage I guess, they could step it down."

"Then why use the giant processor…there had to be a better way."

Van started clipping wires to the contacts. "Well thankfully, we're not here to fix the design, we just get to figure out how to break into it." She turned and gave him a devilish smile.

Chuck had to admit that it had sounded like fun, a couple hours before. Now it seemed kind of tedious. After they'd gotten the contacts connected, they'd set a computer program up to probe different inputs to the device. It was just cycling through to see what kind of a response it was getting and then collecting the output.

That left a lot of time to talk, which Van clearly enjoyed. They talked about a lot of things. Her trip to Comicon the previous year, their competitions as high school matheletes, which was better, Star Trek original or The Next Generation (obviously original). Van was easy to talk to once you got past the flirting, in fact, once alone she seemed slightly disarmed which was a project could take weeks and it would have been a major pain if she'd been flirting the entire time.

Chuck didn't realize how late it had gotten until a noisy buzz permeated the room. They looked up to the monitor that showed who was outside the door and Chuck saw Sarah standing there. "Oh crap," he said checking his watch and realizing it was thirty minutes after they were supposed to leave.

"What's she doing here?" Van asked somewhat acidly.

"I was supposed to meet up with her, we're taking the bus back together," Chuck replied.

Chuck couldn't quite reconcile the anger on Van's face. Why was she so upset? Chuck went to open the door, but Van stopped him. "You can't open the door when this is out of the safe." Van pointed to the phone they'd disassembled.

"Oh crap, right."

"There's an intercom next to the door, just tell her I'll give you a ride home," Van suggested.

Chuck pressed the button on the intercom. "Hey, Sarah, just a sec, I'll be right out." Turning back to Van he said. "Why don't we call it a day?"

"But we're making good progress," Van argued.

"The test cycle still has hours, we can start it again tomorrow."

"But…" Van started.

"We're not going to finish it in a day, so let's just not burn ourselves out."

Van huffed, but she started disconnecting the equipment. "I thought I told you to stay away from her."

Chuck rolled his eyes. "She's not like you think."

Van glared at him. "She's exactly like I think, trust me."

"Really," Chuck shook his head. "We're friends. We're going to see a movie this weekend."

This time Van's glare could have melted metal. "You're _dating_ her?"

For the first time, Chuck began to feel a bit hot under the collar. "Well…" Chuck hedged.

"Men," Van grumbled. "I can't believe after what I told you, you'd just go and ask her out anyway. She's dangerous, Chuck."

"Van, relax, it's fine."

Van didn't speak to him while she packed up the lab. Chuck tried to help out but by the way he was rebuffed, he was better off standing out of her way.

When she sealed the phone in the safe she said. "We need a code." Her voice was still frosty.

"For the safe?"

"Duh."

Chuck grunted at the attitude, but decided to make a piece offering. "How about NCC-1701?"

This got a brief smile from Van. "Told you the original was better." She punched the code into safe and locked it.

The button to release the door lit up and Chuck opened it.

Sarah was waiting for him on the other side, all smiles. "We're still riding the bus together?" she asked.

"Yeah, of course." Then, as a means of apology: "We lost track of time."

Sarah's eyes narrowed as she looked behind him into the lab. Van brushed passed both of them, without even glancing at Sarah. "See you tomorrow, Chuck," she called. "Enjoy your bus ride."

When Van walked far enough to be out of earshot Sarah turned towards him. "What the hell is she doing in here?"

They were in the car on the way home before Chuck really got a chance to explain.

"What part of secret, your eyes only, do they not understand?" Sarah fumed.

"Tom didn't think it was a good idea for me to go solo on my first project lead."

"I don't care what he thinks, this is a matter of national security, he works for the National Security Administration, does he not understand National Security?"

Chuck was too afraid to hedge a response but the tension from the silence was even worse.

"He does, it was impressed upon him how important this was, so he didn't want to have his least experienced person working on it alone."

Sarah huffed again.

"Look, she knows a lot about cell phones and she's been a huge help already. This is good; the two of us will make much better progress on this than we would alone."

"She's not interested in the _project_, Chuck."

"That's not fair. She worked really hard today and she took her work very seriously."

Sarah took her eyes off the road. "I can't believe you want her on this, when you know what she's really after."

Chuck rolled his eyes, which was a mistake because Sarah caught him. She glared at him. "Look, I know she likes to flirt and all, but it's not just with me. Even if she is interested, you don't have anything to worry about."

"Right," Sarah said sarcastically.

"Do you think so little of me?" Chuck asked.

"No," Sarah shook her head. Her anger instantly defused. "Of course not, but that doesn't mean I trust Vanessa Thompson."

They'd rolled to a stop in front of the house and Chuck knew Sarah needed to get to the FBI, but he didn't really want to leave it like this.

"You're the one I want. The only one." Chuck tried to assure her.

Sarah nodded half heartedly and Chuck knew she didn't really believe him. He didn't know what else to say however.

"Are we really going to movie on Sunday?" Chuck asked.

"I've got the day off," Sarah shrugged. "We'll do whatever you want to do."

"A movie sounds great. Will I see you tonight?"

"I'll try," Sarah replied sadly.

"Okay… I'll see you soon."

Sarah kissed him goodbye, but she was shaking her head as she pulled away in the car. Chuck didn't know what else he could say to reassure her. Van was pretty and she was nice, but she wasn't Sarah.

_**A/N: You should all thank Malamoo for this update. She got this back to me on Sunday despite being exhausted and sunburned. If she hadn't you all would have had to wait until next week. So yeah…there. **_


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